


Advice In Old Age

by tb_ll57



Series: Growing Up Is Optional [2]
Category: Gundam Wing
Genre: Children of Characters, Future Fic, M/M, post - endless waltz
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-14
Updated: 2014-04-14
Packaged: 2018-01-19 07:40:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 35,973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1461244
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tb_ll57/pseuds/tb_ll57
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Winners were easy to love individually, but taken all together they usually left Trowa with a headache.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Malkie

'Ahh, now, who's a big boy?' Quatre crooned. 'Who's my little man?'

'You talk to the kid like he's a dog,' Trowa observed. 'Although it might make toilet training easier.'

Quat shot him an arched eyebrow. 'When you have children you can raise them as you like. Besides, he's all of three months old. He hardly understands me.'

'Hell of a formative memory.'

'It didn't do Kae any harm, did it?' Quat rubbed noses with his infant son, and bent him back over his lap for a loving tickle. Malcolm squirmed with a wide baby smile, eyes disappearing into folds of newborn chub. Trowa squinted at the clock, sure that minute hand hadn't budged in the last million agonising years of baby play. It couldn't still be nine o'clock?

'Beer,' Kaelin said, and Trowa reached gratefully for a cold bottle. Kaelin sprawled on the couch beside him, sharing a private eye-roll at his father's antics. For that, Trowa could spring a smile. Kaelin had returned from university ready to be pampered and coddled, and instead had been handily usurped by a surprise pregnancy that was twenty-two years late. Personally, Trowa thought Kaelin was handling it well-- not exactly embracing a baby brother with open arms, but resigned and puzzled were acceptable emotional reactions for a spoilt young man used to being the centre of his parents' lives. Kae even managed to be-- occasionally-- helpful. As long as he didn't have to change diapers.

'You haven't really told me anything about Tahiti,' Quat said then. 'I assume gorgeous and relaxing?'

'I was working,' Trowa reminded him.

'Oh, of course. Security analysts always choose popular holiday resorts in French Polynesia for the serious work atmosphere.'

'It was perfect,' Kaelin conceded. He traced a line down Trowa's neck. 'Except for Mister Farmer Tan here.'

'Too much sun is bad for you.' There were other things that were dangerous in copious consumption, and they'd done plenty of that. Trowa didn't get black-out drunk very often, but they'd managed twice in that week-long conference. Thirty-eight was definitely too old to recover easily from that kind of epic hangover. Kaelin, of course, breezed through it. To be twenty-two again. Trowa envied it. Then again, sleeping with it was enough of a handful. Trowa swallowed a large mouthful of beer. 'So. Malcolm. Not exactly a family name.'

'Honestly, we couldn't agree on anything else.' Quatre kissed the baby's scrunched forehead, and dangled him on one jouncing knee. 'I put my foot down on Vincenzo, and she rejected Saman.'

'Wise,' Trowa said. 'So did you just draw names from a hat?'

Kaelin stole his beer for a sip. 'The Watsons had a dog named Malcolm. They named my brother after a beagle.'

Trowa laughed. 'It was probably a coincidence.'

'No, it was the beagle,' Quatre replied. 'Why throw out a great name just because the beagle had it first? Besides, the original Malcolm died before the baby was born. It's kosher.'

'You're Muslim, Quat.'

'Married to a Catholic,' Kaelin added.

'I like kosher salt,' Quat said. Kaelin rolled his eyes again. This time, Trowa joined him.

'You're cracked,' Trowa told him, and gave Kaelin his beer. He went to the kitchen for another, and opened the refrigerator to check for treats. He rejected Quat's secret cookie stash, poorly disguised as a wheat cereal box, and reached for a yoghurt. 'Maybe Noin just finally sucked you dry.'

'He sneaked a piece of the pie at dinner,' Kaelin tattled, grinning toothily at his father. 'It's a sugar rush.'

'That's today's excuse, anyway.' Trowa rejoined them on the couches, flopping backward. Quat was chewing his lip, and Trowa let him off with a little sigh. 'Nothing wrong with the name Malcolm.'

Quat laughed at him. 'Thank you. Malcolm Mohomed Lucretius Winner.'

Trowa winced. 'That's just fucked up, Quat.' He peeled the lid off his yoghurt, and nudged Kaelin. 'What's your full name?'

'Kaelin Winner.'

'How come Malcolm gets three given names?'

'I wanted him to have options for nicknames,' Quat explained, as if he'd never actually examined the ridiculousness of that statement compared to those chosen names. 'Not that I'd trade my darling boy for anything, but I was hoping for a girl. You would've liked a sister, Kaelin.'

'I have twenty-nine aunts. And seven more on Mom's side.' Kaelin stretched an arm over Trowa's shoulders. 'The last thing we needed was another girl.'

Trowa had the picture of Quat surrounded by a bevy of little blond heads, and had to admit it it looked right. 'Hey, Lucy's still young. Go for it.'

Quat only made a face at him. 'I don't know if I can take more early wake-up calls.'

'You mean the ball and chain doesn't get up with the kids?'

'She gets PM, I get AM.' He jiggled Malcolm, who lolled uninterestingly. If Malcolm had the family looks in his DNA, it wasn't showing yet. Privately, Trowa thought the kid looked more like a potato than a miniature person-- chunky, pasty, and bald. And drooling. Then again, Kae had looked like that, at that age. Maybe there was no telling. Maybe it was Noin's side of the family.

'You're thinking mean thoughts,' Kaelin whispered to him. 'I can always tell.'

Trowa popped a spoonful of yoghurt in. 'You're lying.'

'Am not. You get a little wrinkle. Right here.' Kaelin touched a fingertip to Trowa's brow. 'Missing Tahiti already?'

'I haven't caught up on all the sleep I lost in Tahiti.'

'You and Mom should go,' Kaelin said then, to his father. 'When's the last time you actually took a vacation?'

'I'd love to, if I thought I could get away from the office for more than four hours. And we learnt our lesson with you, anyway. Never take a baby on holiday.' Quat stood, propping Malcolm onto his shoulder and walking him to the window. He pressed a tender kiss on his son's bare scalp, with a soft proud smile. 'Kae, you won't remember this, but your mum was ill for a long time after the birth, and your uncle Wufei used to stay up with me all night, in the Redecorating Room-- you loved that disco-looking chandelier, you'd stare at it forever, and Wufei would just hold you for hours and hours and hours. And you cried every time I touched you. I thought I was the worst father in the world.'

Trowa remembered that. How panicked Quat had been. Eighteen and running on no sleep, torn between a demanding company and a colicky infant. Kaelin had had an ear-splitting screech, those days. And if that half-remembered argument on one of the Tahitian bar-hopping adventures was real, still did have. 'Never would have guessed Wufei would be good with babies.'

'Oh, I think he loved it. Even when Kae had that bad patch with the formula and threw up every single bottle.'

Kaelin rolled his eyes again. Trowa grinned. 'I think we're embarrassing him.'

'I haven't even begun to pull out pictures yet, have I, Malkie? No, I haven't.'

'Of all the nicknames you could have chosen, Malkie? Give me that kid.' Trowa met Quat at the window and swept the baby up, protecting his head as he cradled him in the crook of his arm. Maybe not as ugly up close. And Quatre's blue eyes, very clear for a baby. Malcolm Whatever Winner. Trowa almost felt-- affectionate, for that. Probably a sign of incipient dementia.

'What's wrong with Malkie?' Quat retreated to his couch and made himself comfortable, propping his feet up on a cushion and pillowing his head. 'Kae, you won't remember this either, but Trowa dropped you once.'

Kaelin looked at Trowa on cue. 'You _dropped_ me?'

Trowa winced. 'You were wiggly!'

'And what, you forgot to hold on?'

Quat laughed. 'Well,it was you or the beer...'

'That's low, Quat.' He eased Malcolm up to his shoulder. The kid was dropping off, eyes dragging closed, a string of drool leaving a wet patch on Trowa's shirt. He was a hot little weight in Trowa's arms, all limp sagging limbs and a big cushion of cotton diaper. 'It was at your second birthday party,' he told Kaelin. 'Your dad was taking pictures. Your mom was grilling, and no-one should ever let your mother near an open flame. The thing was flaring up five feet over the top of the grill. And you... you thought the whole thing was exciting as hell. You thought you could catch it. Anyway, I turned to say something to your dad about it and you just launched yourself.' He tapped his hairline, and Kaelin mimicked him, finding the small scar line there. 'Three stitches. I thought they'd never forgive me.'

'I never knew how I got that.'

'My fault.' He bent down to kiss it. 'Forgive me?'

'It's the gentlemanly thing to do.' Kaelin gave him a lick of tongue, and flicked his ear. 'Give me Malcolm.'

He made the handoff, and Kaelin settled back with his brother, awkward at it but making the attempt, at least. Trowa left him at it, sitting on Quatre's side of the room to finish his yoghurt. Quat was pretending to be asleep-- pretending, Trowa wasn't sure why, except maybe to ignore his son and his ex-lover making out in front of him. Fair enough. Trowa was fairly sure that was the vibe he'd been getting lately. Kaelin had come back from university a different person than he'd been when he'd gone in, three years ago. Had always been bright, had always been impatient and driven; but he was focussed now, too, wanting something he didn't have. Whatever that was, he hadn't said yet. But Quat seemed to be treating it as a bomb waiting to drop. For his own part Trowa had just been laying low and keeping out of it. Noin's pregnancy hadn't been easy and he hadn't seen the need to present her an easy target for her famous temper. He was running out of options now, though. Trips to Tahiti weren't in his usual roster of excuses. Maybe Kaelin could be convinced he needed to take a world tour for his further education, or something.

'Hey.' Kaelin nodded at Quat. 'Is he out?'

Trowa bent over to check. Those deep breaths did look real. Quat had an arm propped over his eyes, but his hand was convincingly loose. New father exhaustion was neither pretty nor convenient. 'I think so.'

'So's the baby. Let's leave them to it.' Kaelin laid Malcolm out in the crib in the corner, while Trowa binned his yoghurt and lowered the lights. Kaelin set one of the baby monitors beside his father's couch, and together they left the rec room. Trowa closed the door behind them as quietly as he could. Kaelin leaned on the door, snagging Trowa's fingers to his lips.

'Is it just me, or is he weird lately?'

'Yeah. He's pretty strung out.'

'I've hardly even seen Mom since I got back. She's coordinating some new campaign for the Preventers Foundation Support Network, and she's barely ever here. She wants to get a nanny, but Dad says no.'

'They never had one with you either,' Trowa pointed out. 'He had a crib in his office for you.'

'This must be the night for things I don't remember.' Kaelin smirked at him, enjoying the bumblebee sting of that sideways stab at their age difference. 'Come put me to bed. I have to get up bright and early tomorrow.'

'What's up tomorrow?'

'Dad wants me to come meet some people at the office. He's pushing me toward an internship somewhere.' Kaelin shrugged indifferently. 'If it makes him happy, I can shake hands for a few hours and pretend to be interested in R&D.'

A lot of pretending going on in the Winner family. That news did not make Trowa very happy, but he didn't think Kaelin realised yet what was behind Quat's not-so-little request. 'Who does he want you to meet?'

'Some of the partners, I gather. A couple engineers. You know Dad and his talent promotion schemes. He always has prodigies he's trying to push.'

Quat himself had been a prodigy, once. And yes, Trowa did know a lot about Quatre's schemes for moving talent to the top. Quat was a persuasive man, and there weren't many who could say no to him.

Except maybe Kaelin. Yeah. Kaelin had no problem speaking his mind. He knew what his dad was about and wouldn't let it change his mind. Kaelin was every inch as strong as his father.

'Put you to bed, huh?' he said. 'You staying the night here?'

'I figured it would be easier. Dad gets an early start, even with the baby. Come on. Tuck me in, sing me a lullabye.'

'Sure, brat.'

That Kaelin did remember. Trowa had hardly ever called him anything else. Kaelin glowed smugly at him, and kissed him hard.

Getting to Kaelin's old room in the Winner house meant a considerable trek up and down various stairwells, through the secondary kitchen and past an indoor swimming pool surrounded by arabesque columns and palm trees. Kaelin had his own suite, and for that matter so did Trowa when he cared to stay over, but at the moment he wanted to look at a place that didn't have a couple hundred years of history, didn't have elaborate portraits of dead ancestors and a blunt-force demonstration of obscene wealth. Winners were easy to love individually, but taken all together they usually left Trowa with a headache.

Kaelin shed his coat onto a loveseat in the sitting room, kicked his boots to the rug in the television room, threw his belt at the bath. Trowa caught the shirt when it came flying back, and leant on the bedroom door to watch the trousers fall to the floor. 'You must have been a total slob at university.'

'We actually had housekeepers at uni. If I could convince Dad to go for that, I'd have it made.' Kaelin stripped his undershorts, slipping them down slowly, and faced Trowa dangling them enticingly from a finger right in front of his nethers. 'Not that you're one to talk. I know you have your laundry sent out.'

'I'd rather spend a few extra bucks a month than figure out how to use all those weird settings on the machines.' He grabbed at the waving underpants and pulled Kaelin close to him. He kissed the dimple in Kaelin's cheek, then the vee in his upper lip, then the stubbly tip of his chin. 'Move in with me.'

'I already live with you on summer breaks.'

'You graduated three months ago.'

'True.' Kaelin let the shorts fall, and closed the last of the distance between them. 'You don't have room for all my stuff.'

'You don't have to make excuses. If you don't want to, just say so.'

'I wasn't saying no. I was saying I want a bigger apartment.' Kaelin popped the button of Trowa's jeans and played with the zip. 'Are you coming?'

He kissed Kaelin's neck, because it was just standing there pale and begging to be worshiped. But then he firmly removed Kaelin's hand from his crotch. 'Your parents wouldn't love the idea. And you need to get up early. Like you said.'

'My parents are in separate rooms a thousand feet apart, and in case you haven't noticed, they've got something new to focus on. Meanwhile, I would like to focus on you and me getting reacquainted.'

'That's what you said when you invited yourself along to Tahiti. Not here, okay? I'll sing you that song, then I'll take off.'

Kaelin, per his typical modus operandi, ignored everything he didn't want to hear. That was the other reason Winners gave him a headache. 'Why are you trying not to sleep with me?' he demanded.

'I'm not. I just don't want to fucking do it in your parents' house.' He had to swat Kaelin's hand away again, and physically removed himself from temptation. 'If you want a bigger apartment, I'll get us one.'

Kaelin stood there naked and annoyed, then heaved a sigh and flopped backward onto his four-poster bed. 'With a real kitchen. And a view.'

Kaelin could get a job and contribute some rent, if he wanted to start with the must-haves. Trowa took a stance against the sleek cherry bureau, this time. Kaelin rolled to keep him in eyeline, and knew exactly how good he looked doing it, the little imp. His pert backside made two half-moons on the dark blue duvet, framed by long legs on one end and the arch of a slim muscled back on the other. Kaelin set his chin on his fist, his eyes bright looking back at Trowa, challenging him to keep his distance.

Trowa managed a dry swallow, and kept a level tone. 'You could shop with me.'

Kaelin broke a real smile for that. 'Like old times. Although it just won't be the same, without that crappy hotel you had, in the beginning.'

'We've both grown up a little since then.'

Kaelin stretched out a hand. 'We don't have to fuck. But won't you sleep in the same bed with me?'

'Jesus, you're spoiled.'

'When all I want is you, it's easy to get what I want.'

Yes it was. One day Kaelin was going to come head-on to some real hardship, but it sure wasn't going to be tonight. Trowa melted like butter. Weak-willed, horny butter. He was up and kissing Kaelin before he could chide himself not to. Sitting on the edge of the bed became stroking a hand down Kaelin's bare skin, became lying on the soft duvet beside him, became rolling Kaelin under him and hugging those long legs up around his hips. He regained a fragment of sense when he felt his zip go again, and wrenched his mouth off Kaelin's with an effort.

'I'm not comfortable doing this here,' he tried to explain. 'Your parents--'

Kaelin gave up before he got the full sentence out. He sighed and slid out from under Trowa, dumping him on his side in the bed. But all Kaelin did was pull the duvet out and drape it over them both.

'They have rules,' Trowa said. 'And they're entitled to. Quat's my friend. Okay? And he could still make things hard for us.'

Kaelin fluffed a pillow and settled himself. 'He won't as long as he wants me at WEI.'

So. Maybe Kaelin did know what Quat was trying to do. 'You think he really does?'

'He says it's about laying out my options. I told him about the offer from the London Symphony Orchestra, and he says I should audition if I want, but I don't know.'

'So instead you're going to intern at the mines? You have a degree in music.' Trowa dropped onto his back, staring up at the plaster curliques decorating the ceiling. 'Maybe the two of you should stop playing blackmail games and just be honest about what's going on.'

'Honesty? That's a laugh.'

'That's a problem.'

Kaelin was quiet for a moment. Then he said, 'He does need help at WEI. The shareholders are trying to force him to bring on new partners.'

'Kaelin, you don't want to do this. You've never in your life given a damn about WEI. It's Quatre's business, Quatre's problem.'

'Because of his dad forcing it on him, I know. And he never tried to make me do it. Ever. All my friends, their dads were always having them on for internships, business school, all of that-- Dad let me do what I wanted. I don't know. I don't know when I started to care that WEI's going to end with him.'

'He's been a slave to it his whole life.' Trowa sat up, ripping at the button of his collar to give himself some air. 'Now you'll follow in his footsteps. This is Winner guilt. Shining example.'

'I can't follow him,' Kaelin pointed out. Trowa could feel Kaelin's eyes on him, but couldn't look. His head was hot and he stared at the wall, wishing he'd just left when he knew he ought to. 'Even if I wanted to,' Kaelin went on, 'because I didn't have those internships, because I majored in music, not business theory. And he would never say I'm letting him down, but I hate it, the way the shareholders talk about him. They think he's not as strong as my grandfather.'

'He's different. Not weaker.'

'You don't have to defend him to me. I know.' He felt the backs of Kaelin's fingers on his spine, then reaching around his elbow. He took Kaelin's hand. 'You really feel strongly about this.'

'I've been to this show before,' he said. 'I know the ending.'

Kaelin sat up and embraced him from behind. 'I'm not my father,' he whispered in Trowa's ear. 'I'm going to go there tomorrow and see whatever it is he wants me to see, and I'll do it because it will make him happy. But in the end what I choose to do with my life will be the thing that makes _me_ happy. All right?'

He had to be content with that. Kaelin did, after all, get exactly what he wanted, every time. And he had plenty of time to reflect on that when Kaelin was face-down in his lap, and Trowa was trying to remember why he'd been objecting to them having sex in Quat's house.


	2. Quatre

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _He'd just started to think-- be able to think around the tension in the room-- and there it went again, sucked up into the tight achey pain in his chest. 'It's never a bad thing to question.'_

'Because it made _you_ so happy?' Trowa demanded.

'Oh, please let's rehash every single argument we've ever had, please let's.' Quat spooned puréed squash between Malcolm's lips, and cleaned the spoon by licking it himself. Trowa grimaced at that, turning away to rifle a shelf of baby toys. 'Hand me that bottle, will you? In the bag.'

He found it tucked into a pocket of the diaper bag and passed it. 'You're not doing this because you think he might like it. Or because you need a successor. Hell, you could wait for Malcolm to grow up. You've got twenty solid years before they'd even begin to pressure you to retire.'

'I'm doing it because a little hard work is going to be good for Kaelin, and he'll learn skills like leadership and, probably more important for Kaelin, he'll have to actually listen to someone else for once in his life.'

'That someone being you?' Trowa pointed out. He threw himself backward into a chair, feeling like the wheeze of air out of the leather was like the fight leaking out of his body. 'He's twenty-two years old. And you're pushing him towards the one thing you know I won't tolerate.'

Quat held the bottle to the baby's greedy mouth, working around the little hands that waved in his face. 'I'm not pushing him toward it, I'm asking him to try it. He's the one who declared he wanted a year before he went on to graduate school. He would have done an internship somewhere. And we both know he's never going to listen to me, but the least he can do is learn to have a conversation about it.'

'You know that auditions for the London Symphony Orchestra is code.' Trowa sprung it on him, squinting to watch for Quat's reaction. Quat caught him doing it, too, and took it with far too much calm.

'For the Academy. Yes. I know.'

He'd thought that would come as a complete broadside. But Quat just went on feeding the damn baby, acting like the news that his eldest son wanted to go into the military was just everyday gossip, something not very interesting. Earth-shaking. It should've been earth-shaking. Or maybe Quat could be calm about it because he'd known Trowa would have the pitched battle over it. Kaelin wouldn't speak to Trowa until he took back some of his choicer words, and Trowa had had a lot of those. He'd thought of some he hadn't gotten in at the time, too, and as soon as he could he planned on letting those fly, too--

'Trowa.' Quat used the kid's dirty bib to wipe his face down, and lifted Malcolm out of the high chair. 'I have a telecon at three.'

'So what the hell are you doing about Kaelin?'

'What ought I do?' Quat said reasonably. Trowa flapped a hand at him, too pissed for Quatre's brand of reason. Quat had the balls to just look at him sadly. 'I can't tell him no,' Quat said. 'By any measure he can make his own decision. I'd like him to know what other options there are. I'd like him to do anything else but join the military, but I can't make him.'

'You can't stop him from running off to the army, but you can make him piss away a year of his life at WEI.'

'I asked him to. I'm not _making_ him. He's the one who will decide how much time he gives.'

'Fine.'

Malcolm went down in his playpen with a burp, and Quat dropped a kiss on his head. He waved at his assistant through the glass door, and pointed at his phone. 'Why are you so upset about this?' he asked Trowa. 'And Kae's been slouching about with a face like a thundercloud. Did the two of you fight?'

Trowa pushed to his feet, glaring at the assistant until the girl about-faced way from the door. 'You've resented the demands of your company for as long as I've known you. I don't get why you're pushing him down that same road.'

Quatre came to a halt six inches from Trowa, and waited pointedly until Trowa, grudgingly, got out of his way. Quat circled his desk and sat, tapping his computer out of screensaver. 'I don't want to groom him into the next CEO the way my father did me,' he admitted, opening his email. 'And I've resented it because I didn't have a choice, did I; it was mine the moment my father was killed. But it's been good for me in other ways. It's given me a responsibility to something more than myself. I do want Kaelin to know what that feels like.'

'Hey, whatever, Quat. Just don't be shocked when he doesn't thank you for it.'

'You don't have to tell me how to be a parent, Trowa.'

'Wouldn't dream of it.'

They were silent for a minute, then. Quat was typing something, but looking at Trowa, and Trowa made a point of looking at anything else. Malcolm managed to roll from stomach to back, and lay there kicking with great concentration, squeaking and squawking his frustration. 'Get him?' Quat asked finally. 'He'll cry if he can't turn back over.'

'I'm not your damn babysitter.' But he did as he was told, sliding a hand under Malcolm's belly and giving him a flip. Instant baby happiness. If only everything were that easy, Trowa thought sourly, and rubbed the kid's pudgy bald head.

Quat sighed. 'It's okay for us to want different things for Kaelin,' he ventured. 'I think we're supposed to. But I also think we resolved that several years ago. So what's really wrong here?'

Malcolm rolled again. How was that for a triumph. Goal, attempt, execution, and no extra fuss about it. Trowa tipped him back again, and gave the kid a finger to hold. It took him a lot longer than that to figure out what he wanted, needed, to say, with Quat just sitting there, and the world on hold while Trowa tried to resolve something he fundamentally couldn't. 'Quat...'

A weird plastic noise. Quat, lowering the blinds on his door. He sat on the rug next to Trowa, tucking his loafers under his knees. He put his hand on Trowa's neck, instinctively finding the tension in the muscles. He tugged, and Trowa bent for it. He rested his head on Quat's shoulder, and felt Quat's kiss on the crown of his head. 'You're fathering me,' he mumbled.

'Sometimes you need it.' Quat kissed his hair again. 'Let it out. We'll fight and forgive.'

He had to sit up for it. The anger was still there, but fading fast-- Quat did that to him, and Trowa didn't kid himself that Quat didn't know exactly what he was doing, the sneak. Quat let him go, hands draped peaceably in his lap. Trowa worked at the lump in his throat, and could dredge up a little hate for that, at least, that Quat could still do this to him, too. It was too many years and it was too unfair.

'Wait for him to grow up a little, you said.' He met Quat's eyes, for a full minute, daring him to take a swing. 'I did. Then it's let him enjoy college like a normal kid. No problem. Now you need a year to, I don't know, make him WEI Boy. When are you and the rest of the world going to let him figure out if he wants a life with me?'

Quat pressed his lips together, then let out a slow breath. 'The world. I'm sorry, Trowa, but this is not unexpected. If he'd been your age or if you'd been his, you'd have done that growing together. But this is part of what happens when your relationship has such a large and inevitable impediment. Didn't he deserve those opportunities?'

'Of course he did.'

'Look, WEI Boy or otherwise, he'll be here. You'll be here. It's closer than you'll have been in years. I think you deserve that opportunity, too. I've never been your enemy in this relationship.'

'So what, this is coming from Noin? I thought you had that handled. I thought by now she'd accept that the planet's not flat!' He shoved himself to his feet. 'You know... forget it. Forget I fucking said anything. I'm going home.'

'So long as you come back. Dinner, tonight, remember? You promised a week ago.'

'Not hungry.'

'It's for Duo's visit. He wants to see you. Jamie would like to see you, too. They're never in town.'

Maybe Kaelin wasn't the only brat around. He knew he was misbehaving. He knew, too, he had every right to a hissy, because he wasn't wrong, not about any of it. 'Duo has my number.'

'Yes, which is how he managed to ask you to join us last week.'

It took him longer to work up to this than it had to confront Quatre. It wasn't just Duo who would be there. Noin would be there. He didn't know if he could do it. And Kaelin. He couldn't sit through a dinner with half of the Winner clan raining pot shots from the other side of the table, and Quat playing world's worst mediator from the middle. But if he didn't go-- if he didn't go, Noin won, even if it was a stupid war they were neither of them going to take final victory, and he wanted Kaelin to see he could stick it out, even if that was stupider. 'You've got a call. You're late to dial in.'

'Trowa.'

'I'll be there.' He brushed off whatever it was Quat started to say. 'Just don't talk to me for a while.'

 

**

Duo knocked his boot. 'Pass the wine?'

'I thought you had a cutoff.'

'It's a special occasion.' Duo waggled his glass, pointedly, until Trowa reached for the bottle of chianti on his corner. Duo only filled half the goblet, and used it to toast his son, sitting on the other side of the table by Kaelin. 'Kids look good. Good when they look good, you know.'

'Yeah.' Since the wine was right there, Trowa told his inner voice to quiet down, and refilled his own glass for a third helping. He felt just a little loose, just a little dangerous. And from the looks of things, so did Noin. They were in exact opposite spots at the table, he and her, and when she wasn't fussing over Kaelin there at her right, she was looking at Trowa. The only thing that saved the evening from total waste was that Duo seemed to be having the exact same battle with Hilde, but in reverse; he'd been trying to catch her gaze all night, but she only had eyes for her buff new beau, a muscly sort of fellow who easily made two of Duo.

'Hey. Pass the salt.'

'I don't think there's salt on the table.'

'Really? Cause there sure isn't any in the food.' Didn't stop Duo from forking an embarrassingly large forkful past his chompers. 'What's this stuff?'

'Chicken,' Trowa told him flatly, and pulled Duo's napkin from the table to fling it at him. 'The rest of us are trying to live longer. Eat like an adult, will you?'

'What d'you care how I eat?' Duo did wipe a dribble of balsamic glaze, though. 'How was your trip? Earth, right?'

'Yeah.'

'And?' Duo sipped his wine, and put it down. 'Did I tell you I got a new job? It's sweet, man. Pulling in major dough.'

'Yeah.' Noin stopped glaring at Trowa long enough to pass Jamie the mushroom risotto, adding a Mother Teresa smile of benevolence for the boys. Kaelin even got a motherly kiss. Trowa took a deep swallow of the chianti.

'The uniform's a little rough, but I gotta say, I fill it out. There's nothing like leather and rhinestones to show off what you workin' with, am I right? I think I'm making a name for myself, too. Lollipop-- that's my stage name-- Lollipop's just a sucker on a stick, am I right?'

'What?' Trowa tore his eyes off Noin's fake bitch face and looked at Duo, who was innocently slicing his chicken into bite-size shreds. 'Lollipop?'

'What the hell is up with you?'

'Just to clarify, you're not stripping, right?'

'Tro.'

Noin, of all people, came to his rescue, unwittingly. She tapped her knife on her waterglass, and rose to her feet. 'I want to officially welcome everyone,' she announced, 'but more importantly I want turn everyone's attention to our two graduates.'

Trowa clapped along with the other adults. Jamie was a deep crimson, ducking the attention, but Kaelin preened for all it was worth, inclining his head a dignified inch in acknowledgment.

'We know how hard you both worked, and we can't tell you enough how incredibly proud of you we are.' Noin dropped a hand to Kaelin's shoulder, beaming down at him. 'And there's more good news. Jamie, will you-- no? Hilde, tell us the good news.'

Hilde hugged her son close while he squirmed. 'Jamie got a job. He'll be an Assistant Lab Lead at Nova Solutions on L2.'

They clapped again, Duo adding a strong whistle with his fingers at his lips. Jamie looked like his head might explode with all the blood rushing to it, but let Kaelin goad him into standing for a quick bow. 'That's my boy,' Duo told Trowa, pounding him on the shoulder. 'Jamie, tell 'em what you'll be doing.'

'Discontinuous flyback power supply units for space-going mobile suits.' Jamie got it out in one rushed breath, and ducked back into Kaelin's shadow.

'Smart kid. Damn smart.' Duo finished his wine, but reluctantly let the glass sit empty. 'It's a really good job. Place like that, they'll take care of him. All kinds of benefits and bonuses and promotion potential. He's set.'

'And they want to send him to graduate classes in electronics engineering,' Hilde added. 'And business classes too. They said they'd pay for everything.'

'That's great.' Trowa drummed up a smile for Duo. 'He made good.'

'Yeah, did. Pretty amazing, isn't it, when they tell you they made it.'

Words of doom. Kaelin was standing, too. 'It's not as big as Jamie's news, but I do have something for the next six months.'

Trowa found the bottom of his own wineglass, then.

'Mister Jamshidi at WEI has a special team in place to work on flexible project management,' Kaelin was explaining. 'It's all about creative design. We just go project to project with fast turn-arounds, but total freedom of approach. Mister Jamshidi says the team is all about innovation, and he thinks that my having a background in a non-science field is going to be really beneficial. They have all kinds of people on the team, even an artist.'

'Bully,' Trowa muttered.

He wasn't quite quiet enough. Quat looked at him. Trowa refilled his glass. 'Dude,' Duo said, and hunched into his seat. 'You didn't tell me you were in trouble.'

'I'm not in trouble.' Quat was picking at his meal. He clapped for Kaelin, and smiled at him, but as soon as Kaelin was back to talking with Jamie, Quat was back to pushing chicken in circles on his plate. So. Not pleased? It was what he'd wanted. Kaelin even sounded genuinely excited about the post.

After dinner they all adjourned to the nearest sitting room so the women could coo over the baby and the boys could mill around talking about manly things-- which just about amounted to Duo glowering at Hilde's boyfriend while the rest of them huddled uncomfortably. Quat stared at a Pollock painting on the far wall, and Kaelin forced Jamie into a stilted recitation of answers about his new position. Trowa stood there for as long as he could, and then abandoned sinking ship for the hallway.

He walked straight into Noin.

'Oh,' she said. 'I was just out to get the wine.'

'Yeah.' She had four bottles in her arms. Trowa took two. 'Help you with that.'

'Thank you.' She tucked a shiny lock of hair behind her ear. Showing off the pearls, he thought at first, and then felt vaguely ashamed of himself for going straight for the worst judgment. It was probably just nerves. Or being tired. Quat wasn't the only one figuring out how to deal with a baby after a long time out of practise. There was extra concealer under her eyes, to mask the dark circles. She'd lost more than just the babyweight. She was downright thin.

'Dinner was good,' he began, just as she said, 'I want to speak to you about Kaelin.'

They stared at each other. 'Okay,' Trowa said. 'Um. Now?'

'Do you mind?' The door at her left opened out onto the third-storey landing, which meant a pair of sofa chairs and some kind of modern art thing that looked like it was made out of a week's worth of recycling. Trowa made sure to keep his elbows in as he passed it, and perched on the edge of one of the chairs. He tucked the bottles between his feet, and tucked his hands between his knees.

Noin didn't look any more easy than he felt. She unbuttoned and rebuttoned her cardigan, tugged at the hem of her skirt. 'I'm not sure where to start,' she confessed suddenly.

'I guess it depends on how far back you want to begin.' Her lips pressed tight together, and Trowa apologised before he could let any more snark go slipping out. 'Sorry. Start wherever-- say whatever you need to.'

Her mouth didn't really get any softer, but she didn't look angry. That was probably a good thing. And he didn't think she really wanted-- well, maybe she did, but he didn't think she'd really go all the way to the origins of their current-- disagreement. Or maybe not. She was really chewing it over.

'So.' So if he could just make her spit it out, he might actually not want to die by the time he made it back to his own apartment. 'Kaelin's job sounds good. For the summer. Tailor-made.'

'Practically,' Noin said, with a ghost of a strained smile. 'Quat tried hard to find just the right place for him.'

'I thought Kae was planning to blow him off,' Trowa told her, in a momentary explosion of candour fuelled directly by those three-- four?-- glasses of wine he'd drowned at dinner. 'Guess Quat made the light shine out of this Jirasheeny--'

'Jamshidi. Kamran Jamshidi. He's one of Quatre's cousins, actually.' Noin made a little 'stop' motion with her hands, and faced him head-on. 'Trowa. I would appreciate if you could tell me the truth. Kaelin says you're against him taking this job at WEI.'

Shit. So he was a future-wrecker, as well as home-wrecker. Well, if he couldn't ever win with Noin, he might as well be truthful about it. He didn't owe her any pretty, cushy lies. 'I am,' he said, and braced his arms on the chair, spread his feet a little. 'I think he's wasting his time and his talent. I think this job is a slippery slope and he's going to wake up in twenty years realising he's turned into some abstract Winner ideal with no personality, no life, and no hope of changing it.'

Noin nodded once. 'I agree.'

Well. He hadn't seen that one coming. 'I-- didn't know that.'

'And Quatre just can't see it. Did you know he used to talk about selling his shares? He's had a dozen offers over the years. Then at some point it just stopped being part of the conversation. Now it's Kaelin's turn.' She actually touched his wrist. 'I want to ask you something. I want to ask you to do something. Kaelin will listen to you.'

'Noin—'

'I called the director of the Orchestra. They are holding auditions. He used to dream about the Orchestra like it was nirvana-- I just know that if he goes there, hears them play, sees the city, that he'll remember how much he used to want that. Will you take him? I'll pay for the tickets, for a hotel. Maybe a rental house, so he can really see what it would be like to live there.' She clutched his hand. 'Please?'

It was a strange thing. He found himself, for maybe the first time ever, in complete agreement with Noin. In fact he could picture it right as she was saying it. Kaelin loved travel, and a spontaneous surprise trip to London would sweep him right off his feet. And the orchestra... maybe Noin wasn't too far off. Show him what he was going to be missing. Put him in a real creative environment, a place where there wouldn't be hidden puppet strings trying to steer him, mould him, control him. Next to the corporate world, that orchestra would shine like a beacon, pulling Kaelin in, back to where he'd always wanted to be. The more Trowa thought about it the more he agreed with her, and the more he agreed with her the more he thought she might just be a genius.

'How soon can you pull this off?' he asked her.

'I need two weeks,' she answered promptly, and he wondered how she could even need that long, if she'd gone this far planning it. 'Quatre can't know it's coming.'

Lie to Quat, that's what that meant. But maybe not. Maybe he wouldn't have to. Quat was busy. All Trowa had to do was lay low, for a few weeks. And maybe, maybe if Quat knew, he'd still support it. Options. Laying out Kaelin's options.

Maybe he wouldn't have done it, without the wine, without that argument he'd had with Quat just a few hours ago. Without having sat a whole table away from Kaelin all night without so much as a glance. There was a little voice inside telling him he shouldn't. But that voice wasn't all that strong, just now. 'We're in business,' he told Noin. 'Tell me what I need to do to help.'

Hilde and the walking set of biceps she was calling a boyfriend had departed by the time he returned. Noin didn't follow him in, and no-one moved from the couches where Kaelin and Jamie and Quatre were sitting. Trowa warranted a glance, at least, a quick smile from Quat, a lingering look from Kaelin that coolly assessed and frostily dismissed. Trowa took a deep breath from the gut, and crossed the room for the balcony doors.

Duo was already there. Trowa nodded shortly at him, and sprawled on one of the teak lounge chairs. Then thought twice about his little flounce past the boys. He hadn't brought a beer with him.

Duo left off staring at the city scape and took the lounge next to Trowa's. 'You ever get the feeling you don't belong?' he asked.

Forget beer. If even Duo was going to be depressing, he wanted a bottle of eighty-proof vodka. 'You belong fine,' he said.

'Whatever, Mr Moody. Why are you so pissy today?'

Deep breaths just weren't doing it. 'I need a drink. Maybe you'd do me a favour and go back in there for me? I don't-- feel like getting up.'

Duo sat up. Looked back inside, and leaned wide to nudge the door closed. 'Go you one better,' he said softly, and unzipped his coat. 'You got a light?'

Trowa raised both eyebrows at him. 'What are you, fifteen? Who carries that around?'

'Please.' Duo waited with his hand out, until Trowa surrendered the lighter he carried for Kaelin. Duo put the joint to his lips and lit it, with a long appreciative drag. 'I took it off Jamie at the port. Kid's bright, but not too good at sneaking.'

'You're falling down on the job as a father.' Trowa's moral conscience was at a low ebb anyway, given the choices he'd been making this evening, and in the long run a little recreational drug use struck him more as therapeutic than dangerous. He snapped his fingers, and Duo passed the little slip of paper to him. Trowa inhaled slowly and deeply, letting his lungs fill with tangy smoke. It tasted kind of cheap, but he supposed Jamie couldn't be blamed for that. First-timers wouldn't know good weed if it was growing out of their armpits.

Duo took a second turn with the spliff, and laid back on his lounge. 'I was never much of a dad,' he admitted casually. 'Not like Quat. Quat gave Jamie a hell of a recommendation. For that swank job.'

'Don't be an ass.' He had to wait for the joint, and did it impatiently, until Duo handed it back. 'Jamie's a good kid. And you're not as dumb as you pretend to be. You may want people to think the crack blew all your brain cells, but we both know better.'

'Jesus, you're blunt tonight. You want to tell me what's up your ass?'

He could feel a little badly for that. Duo didn't deserve any of the heat he was feeling. 'Kaelin,' he said, to the limit of his honesty. 'Sorry.'

'Now the part that's not obvious to everyone with eyes.'

He almost told Duo to shove it. It hovered there on his lips, something nice and nasty that guaranteed him a month or two of silence in which to pity himself. Maybe he was already pretty deep into the self-pity-- or maybe the weed was better than he thought, because the fight just wasn't in him. And what the hell. Maybe he could even use some perspective.

'Noin wants me to take him to Earth,' he told Duo, so low Duo had to lean in toward him. 'She just dropped that in my lap after dinner. Take him to Earth to get him away from this job at Winner.'

'What? Why?'

'Because he's wasting his life, that's why. Who the fuck cares about the Winner pedigree? He's all keen right now on actually getting along with his dad, but once he's seen a little more of life he'll realise it's just a bottomless pit. Noin thinks-- I think... maybe what he really needs is a little nudge off the plate.'

'Okay, there were, like, thirteen metaphors in that.' Duo swung his legs to the brick below. 'Am I hearing correctly that you're going to kidnap Kaelin to Earth so that he physically can't take a job at Quat's company?'

'Well-- yes.'

'With his mom's approval.'

'Yeah.'

'And you think this represents some kind of good idea.'

'Fuck, Duo.' He sucked hard on the joint. 'So you're against it.'

'Most people are thrilled when their kids get a good job, man. Kaelin sounded like he was pretty thrilled. And he's a grown-ass adult, not a five year old who can be distracted by gift-wrap.' Duo swatted him on the knee. 'What do you have against his job?'

'You know what, forget I brought it up. I don't feel like hanging around to be criticised by yet another grown-ass adult.' He pushed it all the way to the burning fringe of the joint, and brushed the ash off on his blue jeans. 'And he's not my kid. He's my lover. Let's get that straight. Noin gets to be a concerned mom. I get to be the guy who's trying to live out a relationship without getting a god-damn vote in the direction it's going.'

Duo's face was unwontedly solemn, studying him. Trowa rubbed his nose, and dropped his head back to the teak chaise.

'Those days--' Duo set a foot to Trowa's lounge and kicked. It skidded four inches across the brick, while Trowa glared at him. 'Thanks for paying attention. I'll keep it short. We were young. Too young, I think. All of us. Making kids while we weren't any more than kids ourselves.'

'God.'

'But you didn't. So you don't know. I'm serious. You don't know, Tro, what it's like, so you need to take a breath and realise that. You don't know where the rest of us are coming from, and that was your choice.' Duo waited for his agreement, or wanted something more at least than the snort of contempt Trowa offered. So Duo blew him off in return with a pointed flip of the vee, and slumped back into his lounger. 'Or maybe I'm just a broke NA reject who doesn't know any better. You can ignore me if you feel like it, but I tried.'

Trowa was getting awfully tired of being attacked about his choices. What the hell kind of world was he living in, that even Duo scolded him, that Noin was the only person who seemed to think he had a solid head on his shoulders? 'I don't have a single damn regret,' he said. 'Not one.'

'Whatever.'

'I'm watching the longest commitment I've ever had fall apart. You know what, we're going to fight if you keep this up.'

Duo huffed. 'You mean you're going to lose if we fight.' But he sat back on his lounge, arms crossed behind his head. 'So when you do leave for Earth.'

Trowa glared hard enough at a solar panel overhead to pop it off. 'Two weeks.'

'Have fun with that.'

'I will.'

'Good. Get me a souvenir. Something with a naked chick.'

'Duo—'

'And just to save myself a phone call, I'll say it now. I told you so.'

'Duo,' Trowa said, 'shut the hell up.'

 

**

 

Screw Duo. Trowa started the two-week countdown at 6:34 AM the next day.

It was good to have a plan. He had it all playing out in his head right from the minute he awoke. It was good to have an ambition again, good to have a driving factor that defined everything ahead of it. He liked that zone, he could operate in that zone forever, focus narrowed, goal in sight, all obstacles just puzzles waiting to be solved. He awoke feeling on point, ready to move.

He worked out for a whole hour in the gym, gave himself a long shower, trimmed his hair over his sink, even remembered to break out the dental floss. He chose his clothes with more than the usual care, pulling the tag off a new pair of black denims, tucking in his shirt, taking the time to buff his lone pair of loafers. When he checked the final product in the mirror, he congratulated himself on a job well done. No sullen slouch, not now. He smiled at his reflection, his mildest, most pleasant smile, and felt he was ready.

He let himself in at the Winner estate with his key, and crossed a marble-paved dance hall and an abandoned orangery to get to the family kitchen. In previous generations, Quat had told him once, there had been dozens of household staff, and there'd been dozens of Winners, too, to be catered and pampered in high style. These days, the kitchen was like the rest of the house-- a monument to waste. The kitchen was bigger than all of Trowa's apartment. It took him five tries to find the refrigerator that actually held food. He lit a burner on one of the six cooking stations, selected a pan from the million or two hanging from the ceiling, and set to work. By his watch, he had forty minutes to Kaelin's morning departure, and he wanted to time it right-- not too much, not too little. He kept an eye on the time as he cooked.

He knocked on Kaelin's door twenty minutes later, and waited another minute after that for it to be answered. He shifted his tray to the left hand, and drew a deep breath.

Step One: Apologise to Kaelin For Being An Asshat.

'Brought you breakfast,' he said, before Kaelin could do more than look suspicious to find him standing there. 'I know you don't usually eat it, but...'

Kaelin looked at the tray, looked at his face. Not suspicious, now, so much as cautious. Kaelin licked his lips. 'Thanks,' he said. 'I'm, um, not quite ready yet.'

'No, I figured.' He hefted the tray suggestively. 'But maybe you could see your way to letting me in, at least? I won't make you late, I promise.'

It was working. Kaelin couldn't resist a chance to say 'I told you so', and Trowa had neatly robbed him of that opportunity by behaving exactly opposite of what Kaelin expected out of him. Neither of them dealt with surprise all that well, as a point of personality. Kaelin was off his game, and Trowa began to count it as a success.

'I guess,' Kaelin muttered, somewhat less than graciously. But he opened the door to let Trowa enter, and investigated the tray when Trowa propped it on the arm of the couch in the sitting room. 'You cooked this?'

'Special occasion.'

'Which is?'

Now for the hard sell. It needed the right amount of reluctance-- he was Trowa Barton, after all, and Trowa Barton didn't do apologies any better than he did surprise. It was a little easier to swallow, knowing he needed to get this right to get the next steps right, too-- but it was still an apology for something he didn't think he'd done wrong. It wasn't entirely faked, the minute it took him to work up to it. He distracted himself by picking a tie out of the tangle on the table.

'Work going well?' he asked finally.

'Yes,' Kaelin said. No room for misinterpretation there. 'I'm enjoying it a lot more than I expected to.'

'Seemed that way.' He chose a silly slip of salmon pink silk, and tossed it at Kaelin. 'So I guess I should've been... supportive. Glad for you.'

'Would have been nice,' Kaelin replied, no tone in that. He draped the tie around his neck and sat on the couch. Trowa watched from the corners of his eyes as Kaelin unwrapped his napkin and fork, and poked at the omelette Trowa had made for him. Halfway there, if Kaelin was willing to actually eat it. Winners didn't allow distractions if they weren't willing to be distracted. And Kaelin was half Italian. He knew when food was more than food.

'Maybe you could tell me more about it,' Trowa said then. 'What kind of projects you're working on. If you want.'

'If you want,' Kaelin countered, but cut off a corner of the omelette and ate it, so Trowa considered that just some leftover snot, and not a serious argument. 'It might bore you.'

'You're never boring, Kae. A lot of other things, yes, but not ever boring.'

The side of Kaelin's mouth turned up just a little, at that. 'That had to cost you.'

'More than a little, brat.' He leaned on the wall behind him, slipping his hands into his pockets. 'Come over for dinner tonight. You can wow me at length.'

'We'll go out.' Kaelin ate another bite. 'You're not so good at cooking that I want to try it twice in one day.'

Forgiven. Trowa smiled his best smile, and Kaelin actually laughed.

They got in a minute of making out while he tied Kaelin's tie for him, and another minute of making out as he buttoned Kaelin's coat, and another minute after that because starting was a lot better than stopping. But Kaelin did finally stop it, stepping back with a sigh, rubbing his plump lips to hide the tender swelling. Trowa tugged one of the black curls that flopped over Kaelin's forehead, and let him go. 'See you tonight,' he said.

'Yeah.' Kaelin touched Trowa's chin with his thumb. 'Trowa-- thank you. For being the one to reach out, this time.'

He putzed around for a while after that, high on a feeling of accomplishment. He tidied Kaelin's rooms, or at least made smaller piles out of related things, and then he took the breakfast tray back to the kitchen to wash it. He helped himself to a mug of coffee, rewarding himself with a healthy dose of real cream. He was rinsing the french press when the door swung open behind him.

Quat.

All right. He'd planned on dealing with Quat somewhere around Step Five, but every plan had to have room for improvisation. So. Step Two: Keep It Normal In Front Of Quatre. No problem.

'Thought you'd be at work by now,' he said casually, and overturned the press on the drying rack. 'Kae got out about a half hour ago.'

'Feeling under the weather,' Quat answered shortly. He stood there in the doorway for a minute, until Trowa began to wonder if maybe it was a little too early for Step Two after all; but then he moved, coming in all the way, headed for the teapot. 'I didn't know you stayed last night.'

'I didn't. Just came over this morning to see Kae.' Trowa sidled sideways toward safety on the far side of the nearest island. Quat did look a little ill, actually. And was barefoot. He didn't know the last time he'd seen Quat barefoot. 'You okay?'

'Fine.'

Right. Kaelin hadn't put up this much fight. Maybe time for a strategic disappearance. But his legs didn't follow his thoughts, and they just went on standing there, independent of his uncertainty. His mouth wasn't any more in sync. It opened, all on its own, and said, 'You can tell me if it will help.'

God. Sometimes he was his own worst enemy.

But Quat twisted to look at him. Had his attention. And the possibility of a new strategy came with that opportunity, really. Trowa had always preferred a good offence, and nine times out of ten misdirection was more useful than retreat. Two weeks of sneaking around-- him and Noin both sneaking around-- was a long time for something to go wrong. Giving Quat something else to think about was just a smart play.

So he improvised. 'Sit,' he said. 'I'm in a cooking mood today. I'll make you breakfast.'

Quat wasn't his son. Quat dealt with surprise just fine. So when his eyes went narrow and he got a look like he was cottoning on to the plan, Trowa moved fast to keep his brain occupied. He put a mug out in front of Quat and got the tea canister, poured the cream. 'Eggs?' he asked, turning to dig in the drawer for flatware. 'Or maybe hot cereal?'

'Hot cereal,' Quat answered, and took a slow seat on the stool Trowa nodded toward. 'This is... nice of you.'

'No problem.' Oats were in the pantry, he was fairly sure. It took some looking. He found demarara sugar hidden behind bicarbonate soda, and liberated a generous sampling of toppings. He set them out in front of Quat, lining up the almonds and filberts and currants and cinnamon, and circling wide to take the pot off the stove to pour hot water. Quat watched him warily the whole time.

And was no fool, anyway. He fully expected it when Quat said, 'Last night you were upset. I'm-- glad-- that today you seem better.'

'Had a long talk with Duo,' he admitted, skipping over the way it had ended. Duo wasn't exactly a bastion of good behaviour, after all. 'I have a little more clarity today. Figured some things out.'

'That's good.' Quat dunked his teabag a few times, and finally seemed to accept Trowa at face value. 'I was worried for you. You looked so unhappy.'

'I don't know if I'm exactly happy yet, but I'm figuring it out.' Close enough to the truth. 'You look rough,' he said, shaking out a cup of oats into a pot. 'Baby still keeping you up late?'

'No, Malcolm went down well last night, actually. I just didn't sleep well.' Quat squeezed the teabag between forefinger and thumb, and let it go with a sigh. 'I can't remember the last time I took a day off work. I just couldn't get out of bed this morning.'

'Everyone needs a day once in a while. Maybe you and Noin could do something special, just the two of you. Make it an outing.'

Quat pushed his mug away. 'Not today,' he said flatly.

He gave that a minute, and gave Misdirection another thinking through, too. Quat didn't have moods like this. Quat didn't get out of sorts. Had Noin spilled the plan somehow? But then if Quat knew, he wouldn't be playing it cool. Quat confronted. If he knew Trowa was going behind his back on anything, Trowa would know he knew. Definitely.

While he dithered over it, Quat relented. 'I'm sorry,' Quat said, sincere to the hilt, reaching out to touch Trowa's wrist. 'You didn't deserve that. I'm just-- having a day. Need to have a day. Sorry.'

'Everyone needs a day some--' He'd already said that. Quat went eyes-down in his tea. Trowa licked his teeth. 'It's not a problem. You don't have to apologise to me.'

'Thanks for breakfast,' Quat answered. 'I think maybe I'll just take it back to the study.'

Good. Yes. Because awkward was not helpful, not useful in pursuit of the Plan. Not a good instinct. Or rather an old instinct he'd thought was long dead. Over. Time to call bullshit. He'd always been a sucker for that vulnerable look on Quat's face, and he'd never in his life known what to do to make it better, only that he'd give his left nut in the attempt.

'Right,' he agreed. Cleared his throat. 'Um, give me a ring if you want to talk. I guess.'

'Mm,' Quatre said, and left with his bowl of cereal.

 

**

 

Step Two, Re-Revised: Blitz Kaelin With Relationshippy Stuff.

Trowa wasn't a romantic. By any stretch. He managed a few smooth moves, here and there-- he prided himself on having a sense for when a last-ditch attempt needed to be made, at least. He was tingling all over with last-ditch-fever. This needed a list. This needed a clear narrative progression. Events. With curtains.

Kaelin's jaw dropped when Trowa drove him up to the first apartment. Trowa was sort of proud of that, too. 'The Summer Shores? Seriously?'

'You said you wanted bigger.'

'Well you found it.' Kaelin dug a hand under Trowa's ass, and pulled his wallet out of his pocket. 'Have you been holding out on me?'

'I'm not promising you the penthouse, but it's more affordable than I thought.' He stole his wallet back when it waved under his nose. 'Do you want to see the place or do you want to gaze longingly from the pavement?'

'You're seriously thinking about moving here?' They exited the car together, as a valet parker approached with a hand out for the key. Trowa handed it off, and trotted off after Kaelin, who had only stuck around long enough to determine the direction of the lobby. It was, Trowa had to admit, a pretty impressive place, even by Winner standards-- and a good deal better decorated. The interior was all high-vaulted ceilings with airy, open rooms, sleek leather furniture in black and gold. Trowa caught Kaelin trailing acquisitive little fingers over a shell-faced cabinet, and congratulated himself on another good guess. Kaelin had a taste for the better things in life, and this place offered it.

'Pool,' he commented, catching Kaelin's hand and nodding out toward the wrap-around portico ahead of them. 'With a private sauna and gym.'

'This is really affordable?' There were another couple already talking to the agent in the office, but Kaelin stopped on his own to look at the human-sized blow-up portrait of the available floorplans. 'Which one?'

'Two bedrooms, I figured, in case there's ever guests. Hang on.' His phone was buzzing. It wasn't a number he knew, so he sent it to voicemail. 'There's a two-bed, two-bath and loft. Thirteen seventy-five square feet.'

'Isn't that about triple the size of your current place?' Kaelin considered him, not the floor plan, and Trowa avoided looking directly back at him. 'You know,' Kaelin said, 'sometimes you really surprise me.'

His phone went off again. 'This might be work,' he said, and accepted the spontaneous kiss Kaelin bestowed on him, teeth and all. 'Give me just a second. Get someone's attention in there.'

He stepped into an open conference room, setting his ass to the edge of a massive table that felt like real wood. This place would rob him blind, but he supposed it would be worth it. 'Barton,' he answered his phone, scraping the table with a fingernail. Definitely wood.

_'You're not an easy man to get hold of.'_

Zechs. Trowa glanced up the hall for Kaelin, and saw him talking to one of the managers in the lobby. 'Hey,' he said. 'Thanks for that Christmas card.'

He earned himself a warm laugh for that. _'You're almost on time to receive another. You could have called.'_

'You know me.'

_'I do, yes.'_

Gloating. And damn if it didn't make Trowa smile, just a bit. 'What's up? Bad news?'

_'On the contrary. I'll be visiting in the next few days. I was hoping to get some time with you and Kaelin.'_

His popularity on L4 was all out of bounds with his willingness to play nice. 'I'm a little busy,' he punted, glancing out for Kaelin again. They had him before a big interactive screen, walking him through the floorplan. 'I have a trip coming up. To Earth.'

_'Maybe just dinner, then.'_

'Maybe.' Maybe-- maybe a good idea in the making. Kaelin liked Zechs well enough, as long as Zechs was far away from Trowa. Zechs wouldn't have to do anything but stand there and be friendly, and Kaelin would see green. If that didn't goad him into a trip to Earth, nothing would. 'Yeah,' Trowa decided. 'Dinner would be great. When you getting in?'

_'Saturday, your evening. I think Noin has the weekend and Monday set out, but we could plan for Tuesday.'_

'Tuesday it is. Will be good to see you.'

_'You, too, Barton.'_

He hung up in high spirits. Step Three was taking shape. Judiciously Applied, Mostly Decorative Jealousy. Exes could be good for something after all.

They walked through three apartments, Trowa letting Kaelin take the lead. He enjoyed the calculated look on Kaelin's face, the way he examined every inch of space as if it were land waiting to be conquered. He knew what Kaelin was thinking; the couch to go there, the dining set there, carpets, art. More shopping, doubtless. But it would be worth it. It was almost fun. Listening to Kaelin bargain with the sales manager over chrome or bronze finishings had him burying a grin. Kaelin wasn't a born negotiator-- he was a born winner. By the time they left, Kaelin had the manager knocking ten thousand off the price and throwing in an upgrade on the kitchen appliances for free.

'It's perfect,' Kaelin declared, as they parked back at Trowa's obviously deficient current apartment. 'I think I can still get them to come down on the fees. Two hundred a month for lawn maintenance? They have a row of boxwoods on the clubhouse.'

Trowa slung an arm over Kaelin's shoulders as they walked toward the lifts. 'So we agree? Time for a move?'

'We agree.' Kaelin leant on the mirrored wall, hand wrapping tight around Trowa's. 'I appreciate the effort here,' he said then, quite seriously. 'I know we were in a bit of a slump before. I think this is what was missing. Being back in something together. Not just involved in our separate lives.'

'You were at school. We knew it would happen.'

'It wasn't just that. I think we'd forgotten how to share each other.'

'There may be something to that.' He put his shoulder to the wall, too, to that hum of pulleys and gears, with Kaelin's bright blue eyes locked on his face. 'I'm not brilliant at relationships,' he said, and found himself looking at his shoes, instead. 'Sometimes I-- expect more out of other people than I do out of myself.'

'I don't think you're alone in that.' Kaelin kissed him, pliant and surprisingly sweet. 'But this will be good for us. And now that I get an actual paycheque, I don't have to rely on bribe money from Nonna.'

'I wouldn't turn that down. If your grandmother wants to send you cash, you've got plenty of ways to spend it.'

'I'm not stupid,' Kaelin said archly. 'But you know, Dad always said when I earned my own money I'd be prouder of it. I always thought it was some bullshit thing Dads are supposed to say, but he was right. Not that you have to tell him I said that.'

'A battalion of Leos couldn't drag it out of me.' And how. He shrugged as casually as he could. 'You've got plenty of money, Kae. And two trust funds. If you want to take pride in something, be proud of your independence. That's the first thing you lose when you let a job tie you down. I learned that in Preventers. I didn't even figure out I'd lost it until I quit and suddenly had it back again.'

The lift put them out on their floor. Kaelin unlocked their door and took care of shutting it, too, while Trowa kicked his shoes into the foyer closet and hung their jackets. 'Preventers is another thing entirely,' Kaelin said, walking past him for the kitchen. 'You pretend you hate authority, but you fall for it every time. I think you secretly like being told what to do.'

'I think that's some bullshit thing bosses are supposed to say,' he answered, a little tightly. 'I don't fall for authority.'

'It's not a character flaw.' Kaelin rolled his eyes as he dug their bottle of vodka out of the freezer. He nicked two shot glasses from the washer and poured. 'In fact,' Kaelin added, 'I think it's exciting-- in the right context.'

'Context.' He let Kaelin clink the two glasses together, and downed his in a cold wash of alcoholic burn. Kaelin refilled it immediately, and he only sipped it, this time, actually tasting the clean, creamy mouthful. Kaelin took it as a shot again, meeting him eye to eye in a bold dare. 'What about context?'

Kaelin set their glasses aside, and capped the bottle. He stepped in, sliding a hand down around Trowa's thigh and up to the curve of his butt, squeezing. 'Me,' Kaelin said, and applied his tongue in a long stroke up Trowa's neck. 'What other context is there?'

He couldn't even call it arrogance. The kid was right.

His shirt came off button by button-- he did it, with Kaelin egging him on with hot eyes and bribing him for every centimetre of skin by kissing it as it appeared. His knees had gone watery and weird, but Kaelin just propped him against the bar and went right on with his business. Belt, Kaelin indicated, with nothing more than a flick of an eyelash, and Trowa pulled it through the loops with agonising slowness. Kaelin took it from him, and for a second, just a second, Trowa opened his mouth to put a stop to it before it went from sexy roleplay to uncomfortable flashback, but Kaelin knew without having to be told. The belt just went draping over Trowa's shoulders, a cool slip of leather that warmed to his skin, hanging loose until Kaelin slid it slowly taut, the slightest of pinches, a line of pressure that came down over his pecs and ended in Kaelin's fists against his belly. Trowa popped the button on his jeans, lowered the zip, pushed them off his hips, let them fall to his ankles. Kaelin's eyes raked over him, and it was like Trowa could physically feel them on him, breaking him out with gooseflesh, exposure an undeniable titillation. He let Kaelin insinuate a knee between his legs, nudging him open, pressing him back until the dig of the bar trapped him and he was too hard to move any further. Kaelin rubbed him, smirking against his throat, teeth just barely--

He had never hated the universe quite as much as he did when Kaelin's phone beeped.

Kaelin exhaled hard against Trowa's chest. 'I have to check that.'

'No. Seriously.'

'I have to get that. I'm on flex hours.'

'The fuck are flex hours?' But it was already happening. Kaelin had his phone tilted toward the kitchen light, and Trowa was left to ease an impatient organ all by his lonesome. And standing there, ridiculously naked, except for a stupid belt and his pants on the floor. He shuffled around in them, hoping that if he just stood there long enough, Kaelin could take a damn message and finish what he'd started.

No such luck. 'It's Mister Jamshidi,' Kaelin said. 'He wants to pull the team in for a round table. New project.'

'What, now? It's after four.'

'That's how it works in his team.' Kaelin gave him a swift kiss of apology. 'It looks interesting. Feasibility study on the tech merits of the new holography designs Dad was pushing.'

Trowa could not possibly have cared less what it was. He bent for his pants, and zipped his jeans on. Kaelin was getting his coat out, checking himself in the mirror. 'So will you be back tonight?'

'Probably not. Once we get going it's really easier to just stay there all night-- keep the creativity moving as long as we can.' Kaelin pulled the belt from Trowa's neck and handed it to him. 'Sorry. I am. But today was great. Really.'

'Great. Yeah.'

'Don't pout.' Kaelin kissed him again. 'I love you. I'll call before you go to bed. Nine o'clock, right?'

'You're going to make an age crack, now of all times?' He pulled it together to give Kaelin a swat on the behind with the belt. 'Get out of here.'

 

**

 

One night became all the next day. Kaelin forgot to call for the second night, and Trowa gave up on waiting.

He took himself over to the Winner house the next morning, thinking maybe he could hunt down Noin for an update on her end of things. He didn't have a phone number for her-- he'd avoided that circumstance like the plague-- but now he sure could have used it. Traffic in town was bound up by two different accidents, and it took him over an hour to drive a measly two miles. When he finally reached the Winners', he was in a foul mood. He went in the back garden, thinking maybe she'd be out there, then checked on her favourite sitting room and the art gallery and finally her private study, but they were all empty. So much for that.

'Oh,' said Quat, when he turned a corner and nearly ran Trowa over. 'You're here more often than I am, I think.'

'Hey.' Awkward. 'Um, Kae forgot a pair of shoes he likes. I was picking them up for him.'

Quat looked at his empty hands, standing there in a hall half a mansion away from Kaelin's rooms, and gave him a pass on it. 'Tell him he needs to send a card for his aunt's birthday. If he's late she'll be disappointed.'

'Sure.' Trowa checked his watch. 'What are you doing home? Another day off?'

No. No, Quat was making that face again. Trowa felt heartstrings tugging, tried to steel himself, even bit down hard on the inside of his cheek. Quat just stood there looking like he was braced from the inside and brave and strong except it was killing him, and Trowa lasted all of five seconds before he caved.

'I bet I know a place you haven't been in a while.' He plucked the hem of Quat's sleeve, and got the tiniest of smiles in return. 'Come on. You'll like it.'

It was one of the quirks of the Winner generations that the house was more like an experiment in surrealism than a liveable home. Trowa knew its ins and outs as well as anyone could who hadn't been raised in it, but it had been a long time since he'd had to find this room and it took some doing. Quat paced on patiently beside him, and probably figured it out well before they got there, but after three staircases, two turn-abouts, and a short-cut through a library Trowa wasn't sure had always been there, they climbed a rope-ladder up the south-east turret, and Trowa lifted a trapdoor to let them both in.

'Kae's old play house,' he said, and sneezed away a layer of dust.

'I'd almost forgot this was here.' Quat ducked a little wooden mobile of dragons, giving it a spin with a finger. 'He showed it to you?'

'A few times. He and Jamie gave me permission on condition of absolute silence, and threatened I'd grow warts if I ever told.'

'You'd best hope they won't enforce the secrecy agreement.' Quat went to the window, twitching at the star-field curtains, and looked back to smile at Trowa. 'Do you remember those little plays they'd write? Captain Something, and what was the other one, Gundams and Pacifists--'

'The ones where Kaelin was always the hero and Jamie was always the sidekick.'

'Poor Jamie. Though you know, I think Kaelin's quite jealous of how well Jamie's doing at work now.'

Maybe a little. Kaelin was used to being special. Jamie had more than earned his turn, but it did gall Kaelin a little bit, that was true. It was possible it had something to do with Kaelin's new zeal for the project team.

Quat eased down on one of the child-sized chairs at the little plastic tea table. He gingerly sifted through abandoned crayon drawings, something that looked like a bus schedule-- Trowa was sure there was a story behind that one-- and then gave a low whistle. 'What are all these lads mags doing up here? The last time Kaelin played in here he was nine. _Nine_.'

Trowa decided that those little chairs weren't happening. He settled down with his back to the wall, and tucked an old stuffed dinosaur behind his back for cushion. 'How old were you when you lost your cherry?'

'That is not the point. I was an unloved, ignored child rebelling to get attention. Kaelin had toys and affection. He shouldn't have _needed_ to get off.'

'He's male. All boys need to get off.'

'”Jugs”? Why was he reading this?' Quat flipped through it, squinting disapprovingly. 'Oh,' he said then, 'thank God. It must have been Jamie's. What are the odds Duo bought these for them?'

'It's possible,' Trowa said, and wiped his nose before he could sneeze again. 'Or I might have.'

'Oh, Trowa. That's disgusting.'

He laughed, with genuine delight. Quat was watching him sideways, that old sly look. 'Only a little,' he admitted.

'Jugs?'

He sat up to reach the pile of magazines, scattering them with a flip of his hand. He found the one he was looking for, and gave it a yank. He displayed it for Quat-- a very round-bottomed young man wearing just a red Santa hat in front of his groin. '”Sweet Cheeks”. They're well-read, at least.'

Quat made a little noise that indicated a slight rise in interest. He flipped through that magazine, too. Trowa put another dinosaur behind his head, and made himself as comfortable as he could in a room designed for midgets. Hard to remember Kaelin at that age. Fierce and frowning, he was fairly sure. Kaelin had had every reason to be a happy child, but he hadn't been, not really. Kaelin did the big highs and the deep lows-- and Trowa had mostly lived somewhere in the middle of that.

He nodded to the Sweet Cheeks mag. 'We were all curious at that age,' he said. 'Wufei and I talked about it when he found the stash under Kaelin's bed.'

'Horrific.' Quat turned the centrefold out with an appreciative eye, then abruptly tossed it down. 'I'm having a sad old man moment.'

He took Quat's hand from the edge of the table, and enclosed it in his. He stroked, just with his thumb. 'You're not an old man,' he said softly.

That was another look he knew. Old, familiar look-- when they'd been not much older than the kids who'd played up here, but so much older inside, with the world going to hell around them and the duty, the drive to stand between the innocent and the end. And it made Trowa's heart beat faster. Quat's mouth was open, like he was right about to say something, something important, and his eyes were full of things Trowa knew all too much about.

Quat licked his lips. 'Did you ever talk about us?' he asked, dry voice, almost no voice. 'With Wufei.'

'No.' He tried to swallow, but his throat was dry. 'What we had is private.'

Quat played with his fingers. Feeling out the bones in his knuckles. Mapping the length of them. His throat was too dry to swallow.

'Did you?' he asked.

'No.' If only Quat would just look away. He didn't. After a beat, he said, 'I didn't think anyone would understand. And then... it was over, anyway.'

'Not over. Just-- grown into something different.'

'Was he so different from me, then? Kaelin?'

No way under heaven to answer that. Even if he knew the answer. 'I don't compare the two of you,' he said.

'Sometimes I find it hard not to. I wonder if my father did with me.' Quat tracked the lines on Trowa's palm, and Trowa kept absolutely still for it. 'There's a little space under the stairs in the second attic. My little hide-away, when I was young. I made a little fort of old sheets and chairs and I'd take my books and my violin up there. My own tiny world. Father followed me there once. He said at first I shouldn't run away from the rest of them. But then he left me there anyway.'

'You had a lot to deal with. Maybe he knew it.'

'You never met him, did you. He was quite a man. Really. Tall and with a spine so straight you could have measured it with a ruler. I was so proud of him.'

He curled his fingers as Quat's fingertip tickled his palm. 'He and I didn't exactly travel in the same circles.'

Quat's lips turned up in a jagged, momentary smile. Then abruptly he let go. Trowa pressed his hands together, tight between his knees, as Quat climbed out of the chair, shoving with a groan until it tipped over beneath him. Quat settled on the floor opposite Trowa, eyes closed. Trowa pulled his feet in so he had enough room.

'I tried to give Kaelin the best of everything,' Quat said then. 'Even you were the best he could have.'

'I wasn't yours to give, Quat.' His hands were still tingling, even if it was only his imagination. 'Kaelin and I... it's never been even remotely about you. No matter how it might seem.'

'No. I know. I do. I wouldn't have been half so jealous--' Quat stopped himself by biting his lips together. Then he sighed. 'Well, that's a cat that wasn't long in the bag.'

'Wait, what?'

'Oh, please.'

'What?'

'Oh, Trowa. Really? You have to ask?'

'I don't live in your skin, Quatre.'

'I don't know where I live, half the time.' Quat knocked at Trowa's foot with his slipper. 'I've liked having you back here. In my life. It's made me ask questions I might not have, but that's not a bad thing.'

He'd just started to think-- be able to think around the tension in the room-- and there it went again, sucked up into the tight achey pain in his chest. 'It's never a bad thing to question.'

'No.' Quat's eyes were closed. But the way he was breathing suggested great effort. Painful effort. Trowa waited because it never occurred to him not to wait, because Quat was working up to something, or trying not to let something out, maybe, the way he looked--

Whatever he'd expected, it wasn't what Quat said. 'Lucy is leaving me.'

He was poleaxed. It actually stopped his tongue, for a minute. 'Why?' he managed. 'What happened?'

'Twenty years. Specifically, she had an affair. She says it's over, and I suppose I believe her, but I can't look at her without thinking of her with him. We've had him to dinner dozens of times. He'd shake my hand and ask about the children and then they'd go off...'

God. God, he couldn't even comprehend it. 'I thought the two of you were so solid.'

'Did you? I think at our wedding you and Duo stood in the corner taking bets how long it would last.' Quat finally opened his eyes, looking nothing but tired, now. 'Or maybe that was Wufei. Someone with a ponytail.'

'Could've been any one of us.' Had probably been all of them, actually. Even Heero had taken a few cracks. 'We didn't mean it, though,' he covered lamely.

'I love her,' Quat said. 'I know you never understood. But we made a good family together. Then it just stopped, somehow. I don't know. Before you came back, whether or not you believe me.'

He wasn't sure he did. Quat wasn't beyond lying to protect him. But it made him think. 'When was this affair? You never told anyone.'

Quat waved a hand as if it was too much to think about, but his fingers hesitated in the air, and his eyes went closed again. 'What to tell? I thought we were fixing it. Then one night, we were talking, we were laughing... then she was pregnant. I think she thinks I did it on purpose, to make her stay.'

'You wouldn't,' Trowa said immediately, as Quat was saying the same thing. Their eyes caught.

Trowa blinked first. He stared down at his hands. 'I'm so sorry, Quat.'

'No, really. Don't be.'

'What will you do? I mean-- hell, I don't know what I mean.'

'She's going to live with her parents in Italy for a while. She says it's a trial separation. She's not taking the affair, at least.'

'Is she taking the baby?'

Quat leant his head back to the wall. He didn't answer.

'Don't let her.'

'She's his mother.'

'You're his father. It'd kill you to let them go so far.'

Quat's jaw moved. He licked his lips again. 'My lawyer thinks if I let them go, I could lose custody rights. They'd award primary to Lucy. If we get divorced.'

'Can you buy her off?'

'If we get a divorce she'll get all the money she can dream of.'

'Didn't you have a pre-nup?'

'My lawyer asked that same question. If either of you had been in the room when I proposed, that would have been more useful.'

Trowa tipped up a smile obediently, but didn't let Quat shake him off the trail. 'If she's cheating on you, you might have leverage.'

'I don't know. I don't know.'

'You can't be afraid to get dirty,' he said flatly. 'Not if you want to see Malcolm again once she leaves.'

'Maybe I'll just convince her to give me a second shot.'

'Why? What's the point?'

Quat was quiet for a long time. Trowa let him be. It was sure as hell a lot to think about.

'Run away with me,' Quat said finally, with a ghost of a smile. It didn't last. 'Or at least come up here with me tomorrow.'

He nodded. 'Whenever you want.'

Quat's slipper nudged his foot again. 'I do love you.'

'I love you, too.' It didn't even hurt to say it, not now, that minor agony gone in the face of Quat's need. He gave it freely, without regret. 'Always have.'

Quat reached for the leg of the little chair, righting it on its legs, pushing it with a finger. 'I have to tell Kae. About his mother.'

That was a rabbit hole waiting. And it wouldn't go well, and it wouldn't go down without blame-- he knew that. 'Want me to?' he offered.

'No,' Quat replied quietly. 'But I'd take any advice you have lying around.'

'Don't tell him she fucked around. It's not his business.'

'No, of course. And I don't want to hurt their relationship. He's always loved her so much, worshipped her.'

'He sees her flaws. Yours, too. He's a smart kid.'

'That's different from having it said to his face.'

'Yeah.'

A chime went off. A phone. Trowa was really starting to hate phones, these days. He took a deep breath while Quat slid it out of a pocket to check it. 'That's him,' Quat said.

If Kaelin was making calls again, it might mean he was ready to leave the company crib for a real bed at home. 'I should get going,' Trowa said.

'Trowa-- thanks. I could always talk to you.'

'That won't change,' he answered honestly.

Quat curled his legs under him. Then, instead of standing, Quat suddenly grabbed Trowa's hand again. He pressed Trowa's knuckles to his lips, just for a second. And then he was up on his feet and climbing out the trap door.

God.


	3. Kaelin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _This was the hardest. Harder than fake apologies. Harder than real apologies. You didn't leave your flank open. You never left your chest open. Your heart. Vulnerability was death. Or worse. You lived with it, with the hole it ripped in you._

It took him about four hours after that to realise it was all connected.

Four hours was an embarrassingly long time, actually-- the only consolation he had for his unforgivable slowness was that it was Quat. It was Quat, and love, friendship-love, that very deep friendship-love they had together, was just a little too much built on the more-than-friendship love there'd been for just those few years in the beginning, when Quat had changed his whole life.

Changed his whole life. Opened up parts of himself he'd thought were not just atrophied, but had never even existed. Quat had smiled at him and he'd _felt_. Quat had wanted him, and he'd wanted to be wanted, wanted to be worthy. But he'd let himself be scared of it, the enormity of what it asked of him, and so Quat had gone and got fucking married, gone off to be normal, to raise kids and have a company and a nice house and a fundamental security of being that Trowa hadn't really thought could ever be shaken.

Quat was jealous of him with Kaelin.

That shook him. It did. Because Kaelin could only have happened in that world in which Quat was forever off the table for Trowa. He really hadn't imagined. All these years, he'd known how everyone had seen it: poor Trowa Barton, still in love with someone he couldn't have, someone who'd moved on. He'd even bought into that himself, let it affect every relationship, two whole decades of life until--

Kaelin. Who'd waited to grow up for him, had rubbed his face in adoration, demanded commitment, and-- was ready and wanted to be everything to someone. To Trowa. Even knowing there might be hang-ups.

And Trowa did love him. As much as he'd ever loved Quat.

Which meant that even if Noin had only proposed this plan to get Kaelin out of town and away from Winner Enterprises as some sort of gambit in an oncoming divorce, Trowa's reasons for being in on it hadn't changed. The only difference now was that he knew it would kill Quat to find out just how deeply he'd been betrayed by everyone close to him.

Which meant he couldn't do it.

Post-realisation, though, he didn't have a lot of time to chew it over. Kaelin came in just after lunch-hour, carrying bags of groceries, calling his name from the foyer. Trowa shuffled out of the bedroom, steeling himself for anything from a screaming fit of temper to tears. 'Hey,' he opened. 'Um, everything okay.'

'Sorry to be late. I checked in with Dad to say hello.' When he got near enough for it, Kaelin pecked his cheek with a kiss. 'And then, since I assumed you hadn't bothered with the shopping since I took off the other day, I went for food.'

'Food.' Trowa watched him warily, confused by what seemed to be a genuinely chipper mood. 'Speaking of your dad--'

'He said hellos for you. And he told me about the card for Aunt Iraia, so don't worry.' Kaelin whipped an envelope from a bag and waved it. 'I promised to get it in the mail today.'

This was not the Kaelin he knew. The Kaelin he knew would have blown the top off buildings by now, if he knew his parents were splitting. Kaelin had blown his stack over far, far less. Trowa stood there not sure what the hell was going on, and got his arms loaded down with veg as Kaelin started unpacking his purchases.

'I'm exhausted,' Kaelin told him. 'But it's a weird exhaustion. An accomplished exhaustion. We really knocked out that feasibility study. It was even fun. The others elected me moderator this time-- do you know I've never really led a team before? I think I was good at it. I hope. I tried to make sure everyone had a chance to bring their idea to the group. Then I had everyone vote on a final list of what we would pursue, and we did all of the top three for a full day, and then when we came back together to review I had everyone vote again on which project was going best, and everyone thought that focussing on the fidelity of the reconstructed beam was going to be the most problematic for the design specs, so we worked just on that for the next day, and then somehow that sort of warped into working on the holographic data storage aspects, and I said that's a great idea, but I think what we should do is set that aside and keep focussed on the feasibility side, and Mr Jamshidi agreed with me and said that when we're finished with this project we'll do the data storage thing when we're not under deadline. He said I showed good judgment and stayed on point, and that was important for a leader, so he wants me to be moderator for all the projects we've got this month.'

Trowa heard about four words in that running monologue, too busy trying to eke meaning out of the mild flush of excitement on Kaelin's cheeks, the half-minded and easy effort of shelving groceries between pantry and refrigerator. 'Huh,' he said.

'So I brought home a bunch of reading on dynamic holography. Mister Jamshidi said it's not so much important that I understand every little thing about the science but that I know enough to keep the discussion from getting off onto tangents all the time. He said it's really more about managing the people involved and giving them enough space to be creative with enough direction to come up with a product in a short period of time. Then when we've got enough to move it forward, we send it to R&D for practical application.' Kaelin set a big head of lettuce in the colander in the sink, and put both hands on the countertop to look at Trowa. 'Are you all right? You've said “hi” and “huh” since I came in.'

'I kept waiting for you to draw breath.' Kaelin smirked at him, and snagged him by a belt loop. Trowa applied a careful kiss to his upturned mouth. 'You, um, everything okay at home? With your mom and dad?'

'Dad still looks like a mess on his feet, but he said he'll be back in the office tomorrow.' Kaelin shrugged. 'I guess Malcolm is just wearing him out. I said he should switch hours with Mom every other day or something. Or get a nanny like Mom wanted.'

There was no possible way for Kaelin to play it this cool. Quat hadn't told him after all.

Why? Quat sure hadn't sounded like he thought reconciliation was all that possible. Trowa hadn't really believed that bit about convincing Noin to take a mulligan. But why conceal that much even from Kaelin? Unless it was about keeping Kaelin on course. Hell, Quat had known about Noin's affair when this crap about WEI had come up. Maybe the news about Noin wanting a separation was recent, but if this went back to before Malcolm's unexpected arrival, then Quat was more than capable of keeping his eye on all the balls already rolling while he dealt with a new curve. If Quat hadn't told Kaelin, if, for that matter, Noin hadn't told Kaelin, then it had to be because they were both still trying to shove Kaelin down paths of their own choosing.

And that meant Trowa was still the x-factor. The hand on the scale, tipping it one way or the other. And viewed from that perspective Trowa wasn't sure if it wasn't every bit as urgent still that he weigh in. If Kaelin ended up falling into a long-term commitment at WEI, he'd get mixed up in his parents' split, no question. But if Kaelin was safe in London, it wouldn't pull him in. Trowa could keep him out of it, that far away.

'We have dinner tomorrow,' he said, and cleared his throat. 'With Zechs. He's in town.'

'Yeah, I saw him when I went to the house. He and Mom are both on that committee for Preventers Foundation Support. There's some big gala at the end of the month.'

Interesting. If Noin was planning on jumping ship, he wasn't sure what it meant that she'd brought Zechs all the way into the colonies, given that they were eight days from launch on her plan to get Kaelin to Earth. Calling in all allies? Noin was a bright lady. She didn't play without getting her pieces in place first.

Trowa dredged for a smile. 'Open a bottle of wine. It can breathe while we-- get reacquainted.'

'So that's why you're acting distracted.' Kaelin ruffled the hair on Trowa's neck, making him shiver. 'You're so easy.'

'I'm exactly how you like me.'

'Why, do you know, I believe that's true.'

 

They met Zechs at a bar. It was, Trowa recalled, the same bar where he and Zechs had hooked up, not quite four years ago. The décor hadn't changed, and the bartender hadn't either. Trowa got an appraising look when he opened the door, Kaelin got a once-over, but Zechs, bringing up the rear, got a wide-eyed stare of genuine appreciation.

Fair enough.

Zechs looked good-- effortlessly good, like beach models who lounged around in short shorts and tans. Trowa was rather more aware of it than he'd thought he would be. Kaelin was definitely aware of it. He was glued to Trowa's side, and practically sat in his lap at their table.

If Zechs was aware of the by-play, it didn't show. He ordered a top-shelf whiskey for all of them, accepted a menu from a waiter who blushed bright red at his smiled thanks, and flipped chin-length hair behind the curve of his ear. 'Maybe the mahi-mahi,' he said.

Kaelin took Trowa's hand, right there on top of the table. 'So,' he said, a little tightly, but at least polite, 'How's Earth, Mister Merquise?'

'Zechs, please.' Zechs shed his coat, incidentally setting himself on display for the pleasure of the bar. Trowa buried a smile in his waterglass. Merquise managed to be both aware of the attention he got, and above it when it suited him-- that much hadn't changed. He liked the hair. Drew the eye to that chiselled jaw. Of course, Kaelin was looking especially fetching at the moment, dark blue eyes ablaze with challenge, chin high. Slim and sexy in one of his thin cotton vests, draping a bare arm over Trowa's shoulders as he played it cool. Step Three: Mostly Decorative Jealousy seemed to be starting well.

'I heard Une was actually making moves toward retirement,' Trowa said, and turned the menu toward himself and Kaelin. He pointed to the burgers hopefully, but Kaelin shook his head and redirected him to the fish section. He sighed.

'Une will die at her desk,' Zechs shrugged. 'For better or worse. I think she plays the retirement game to up our budget windfalls.'

'You have to admire it.'

'Preventers are already the best-funded bureau of the Justice Department.' Their whiskeys arrived, and Zechs raised his for a toast. Trowa and Kaelin mimicked him. 'To old friends.'

'Old friends,' Trowa echoed, and clinked their glasses. 'Are you staying at the Winners'?'

'I hate to be a bother.' Zechs inclined his head to Kaelin. 'Your parents are always generous to guests, but with the baby there, I thought it better to get a hotel. Besides, I've always had good experiences at the Rampart.'

Good. Exceptional, even. He couldn't have trained Merquise to drop this many innuendos. The flirting was innocent enough, indulgent of an amicable breakup of what hadn't even been a relationship, more like a weekend fling, and it was Merquise all over to push the boundaries, but Kaelin was going to need some privacy if he tried to get any closer to Trowa. Trowa felt fingers along his inseam, and shifted in his seat.

'Where are you living now?' he asked Zechs. 'I thought I heard you moved.'

'Brazil. It's only a two-year posting, but I have to say I'm enjoying the rotation. It's an interesting culture, very passionate and romantic. I have a little bungalow on the beachfront on Santa Catarina Island. It's barely more than a bed and a mosquito net, but I can't say I need much more. Brazilians live in the present. The local chief before me used to be three hours late to everything-- even to a mission briefing, once. It's been an adjustment for this snow-bird.' Zechs sipped his drink. 'Noin tells me you're moving, too.'

'Bigger apartment,' Kaelin answered. 'More permanent for us. Domestic, even.'

'And how do you like working at WEI?'

That, Kaelin warmed up for, while Trowa frowned and tried to actually read his menu. 'More than I expected,' Kaelin said, 'much more, actually. I'd only ever seen what my dad does there, the arguing and the wrangling with the shareholders, the endless reports, the money end of things. I had no idea how much interesting stuff is going on in the other departments. It's not like working in an office at all. Actually, I wish Dad had brought me in on this years ago. I love music, but compared to WEI, sitting in the same chair in an orchestra all day long, playing the same mouldy old symphonies all the time-- it just sounds boring now.'

Trowa took that announcement with alarm. 'It wouldn't be just sitting around playing classics,' he said. 'Don't forget composing. And there's a lot of experimental groups out there. And you loved touring in university.'

'Sure, but essentially a career in orchestral music means no opportunity for individual work, and when you retire from concert performance the only thing you can really do is teach. And at my age the odds of landing a principle chair are almost nil. I don't really feel like waiting decades to be acknowledged.'

'You don't feel like waiting decades to do anything,' Trowa muttered.

'I thought you liked that about me.'

'So you'd rather wait decades at WEI?'

'I don't know,' Kaelin said reasonably. 'But Mister Jamshidi thinks I'm good at management. I think I might be good at it. I can spend a year finding out.'

A year. That was six months more than the original internship. And a year would turn into five before Kaelin could blink, and five years would be the rest of his life in the blink after that.

Trowa finished his whiskey in a single swallow, and launched into Step Four: Flight Plan. He said, 'I forgot to tell you. I have to head to Earth for work. Next week. It came up while you were at your thing the other day.'

'Earth? Again?' Kaelin sat back for that. 'You were just there for work.'

'That's how it goes. There's a conference in Britain. I'm going to demonstrate our new systems security programme.' He caught their server's attention, and waggled his menu. 'I guess it's a little up in the air, but they might also want me to stand up an office there.'

'Britain?' Zechs asked. 'I assume London?'

'London and Edinburgh. They said it's at least nice there right now. Warm.'

'For how long?' Kaelin pressed. His perfect brows came together to form a perfect little wrinkle. He crossed his arms over his chest. 'Last-minute? They're getting awfully high-handed. You couldn't say no?'

'Why would I? It's not Tahiti every day in the real world. I have to put in the hours where it counts. Besides, you're busy with WEI.' He shrugged at Zechs. 'You know how it is. When you get stuck in work crap. Less and less time to yourself, much less a relationship.'

Their server came. 'The mahi-mahi,' Trowa ordered, and Zechs ordered that, too. Kaelin frowned a minute longer. 'Kae?'

'The chicken marinara,' Kaelin said, and that was the last contribution he made to conversation that night.

 

**

 

He waited until Kaelin was asleep. Then he stole Kaelin's phone, and took it down to his car in the parking garage. He climbed in, locked it, just out of paranoia, and searched the millions of entries for Noin.

It rang out to voicemail the first time, and he hung up before it could give him the message box. He didn't want to risk Quat hearing a message from him. Then he changed his mind-- Quat wasn't the kind of husband who snooped. And anyway, he didn't want to wait for Noin to figure out the call wasn't from her son, but from Trowa; he needed information, and soon. So he dialled again, and let it ring out, and then did it a third time.

And finally got an answer, albeit an annoyed one. _'Honey, do you know what time it is?'_ she answered, sounding sleepy and grouchy.

'It's Trowa,' he said. 'I'm sort of surprised you haven't tried to contact me.'

There was a long silence-- a dead silence, like she'd placed her thumb over the receptor. When she spoke again, it was just above a whisper. _'Now is not a good time.'_

'With Quat?' he asked casually. 'Or with someone else.'

The silence this time had a much different quality. _'How dare you,'_ she breathed.

'Do you think I really care? I'm calling because of Kaelin. That's it. I didn't ask you any questions in the beginning, and I'm not going to now.' He picked at the hem of his boxers. 'So about Kaelin. Are we still go on getting him to London?'

_'I have tickets arranged, travel for two on business class to Heathrow Shuttle Port. A friend of mine has a house by the University College of London. He'll only be there the first three days of your trip, and he knows the director of the London Symphony Orchestra. He'll take you and Kaelin to lunch with the director, and get you into a private rehearsal and a concert performance. I've set up theatre tickets, money for the best restaurants, tours of museums. The same in Edinburgh.'_ She paused. _'I have a folder for you. You can pick it up tomorrow.'_

'Okay.' Okay. It was happening. 'He'll ask for time off work. Make sure he gets it.'

_'Kamran will do it for me.'_

'And Quat?'

_'What about him?'_

'The plan is still to blindside him with this.'

_'If he knows about it, he would stop it.'_

'Maybe not. Maybe he'd think it would be good for Kaelin.'

_'If you have doubts, tell me now.'_

There were always doubts. The only thing he knew for certain was that Kaelin at WEI meant the end of their relationship. Kaelin wouldn't just be spending half a week there every once in a while, he'd be there day in and day out, pulled to this project and that project and then two at a time, three at a time, ever-increasing responsibility until suddenly he'd be good as gone. Quat knew better than anyone how that happened-- he'd gone through two babies and half a lifetime without a day off, until his wife told him she was leaving, and suddenly none of it meant anything. Trowa had doubts, but not about this. He didn't want that for Kaelin. Kaelin deserved better.

'I'll come get the papers tomorrow,' he said, and hung up on Noin.

 

**

 

'Again,' Quat observed.

'I thought you were back at work,' Trowa said, getting it out without any of the curse words he was thinking. 'Hi.'

'Hi.' Quat smiled wearily at him. 'You got the message, then. Though you're early. Looking after me?'

Message? He'd had his phone on silent all day, the better to sneak around. He rubbed the plastic lump in his pocket, hating all phones. 'Something like that,' he said. He scratched the back of his neck, and sighed. 'Um, about your message--'

'Actually, I've just finished. It wasn't quite as horrendous as I thought it might be. I think they might even be a bit relieved-- at least for the moment. You know how they've always thought of me.' Quat pushed his shoulders straight and waved both hands in a familiar gesture-- brushing it off for the universe to deal with. 'I thought I'd spend the rest of the afternoon with Malcolm. I know you secretly detest it, but maybe you'd spend the time with me? Oh-- unless you really came to get more shoes for Kaelin.'

'No shoes.' His fingers itched for that folder Noin had left for him, there on the other side of the house. Maybe he could distract Quat and make a break for it. 'Uh, Malcolm. No, I don't detest it. Maybe we could walk him around, though? I want to be moving today.'

'I think that sounds like a good idea.' Quat gestured him ahead, and Trowa dragged his feet into place next to him.

'You okay?' he asked then. 'You seem, um.'

'Better than I thought I would be,' Quat said again, enlightening Trowa exactly none about the content of this apparently very interesting message. But for all the angst there'd been the other day with that confession about Noin and the divorce, Quat seemed almost like his old self again. Determined, with a straight spine and head high, but lively in the eyes, too. Not afraid any more. Before Trowa even knew he was going to do it, he was putting his arm around Quat's neck, and leaning down to give him a squeeze.

'Thank you,' Quat said softly. 'For being my friend. My backbone.'

'You never needed me for that.'

'Maybe not need. But I still want you there.'

'Fair enough.' They turned right for the stairs toward the nursery. 'Noin around?' he asked.

'She's out with Zechs at the local Preventers station. They're pulling together that gala. Awards for especial service, certificates for retirees. And lots of sucking up to the donors.'

'I remember.' If he didn't know better, he'd think Quat was being deliberately obtuse. How was it even possible to have a conversation this long that completely avoided the topic? 'She on board with your whole-- situation?'

'We'll know by dinner. I haven't told her. I've hardly told anyone, except you. I knew you would understand.'

Trowa was in danger of being both a clueless friend and a terrible one. 'Yeah,' he said.

They spent three hours carting baby Malcolm from room to room around the mansion. Malcolm slept through half of it, drooling down Quat's shirt and crying when he managed to be awake, but Quat seemed still to be in that place of worn-out contentment, and Trowa couldn't ruin it. They sat on a marble stairwell under a big stained-glass dome, Malcolm staring up, Quat staring down at him with a gentle finger stroking a soft baby cheek, and Trowa stared at him, wondering.

'Life is going to change,' Quat said. 'One way or another. I think the older I get the more it frightens me. How often change is the same as loss. But not always. Not always. That's the thing to remember. It's worth the risk, because it's not always.'

'Too wise for me.'

'I think you just get impatient with me because you never have to work your way through it the way I do.' Malcolm made a fist in Quat's shirt, and Quat kissed his little hand. 'You're smarter than I am. But that's all right. I do get there, eventually.'

'I'm not that smart.' He rubbed the case of his phone, tempted and trying to ignore the temptation to check the time again. 'What've I ever done with my life but waste a couple decades in Preventers and let Kaelin lead me around by the nose.'

'You give so much more than you know.' Quat touched his wrist. 'Don't shrug it off. You've never been led by anyone, Trowa, and that's what makes you the man you are. You reminded me of that, the last time we talked. I needed to hear it.' He took Trowa's phone, and turned it to the light. 'It's almost time. Kaelin and Lucy will be here soon. And that means I have to order food.'

'You need help with that?'

'No, I can manage a take away menu, I hope. Maybe you could put Malcolm down? He'll nap for a few more hours.'

'Yeah.' He took the baby and jiggled one of his feet until Malcolm grinned toothlessly. 'Meet you where?'

'The balcony over the west addition.'

'Right.'

Quat smiled at him, too. 'Thanks, Trowa.'

He wasted no time getting Malcolm into his crib in the nursery and grabbed the monitor, stuffing it into his coat pocket. He found the singing stuffed bee and put it in the crib with the kid, and left him cooing himself to sleep with his toy. Then he flat out ran across the estate to Noin's set of rooms. He was sweating just a little with the effort of charging up so many useless stairs when he got to her study. He tested the door, glanced up the hall to be sure he was alone, and let himself in.

There was crap everywhere. He knew people who kept a bare office-- Une managed it by keeping everything digital-- but she was a rarity. Noin was clean enough, for a busy lady with a lot of organisational work, but there was paper littering every surface in there, and none of it looked like the promised folder. Trowa shut the door quietly and locked it. Not on the console-- things in piles, but nothing in a folder, and nothing that said 'London' on it. The desk was out, too. He went through everything on it, twice, but most of it was related to her Preventers Support Network. Was this her way of backing out? Had he freaked her out too much, last night, with those digs that he knew about her affair?

On the easy chair by the window. Green manilla folder.

He let out a slow breath, and picked it up. Everything she'd said would be in it was there. The tickets, boarding passes, even a map to the house in London and a rental flat in Scotland. And a cheque-- a pretty outrageous cheque, which more than promised comfort on their trip and a few blow-out parties besides. Say that for the Winner money. It might not have bought happiness, but it did buy opportunity.

He left the folder on the chair and folded all the papers into an envelope for his jacket. His mouth was dry, and he stole a sip of water from a bottle Noin had sitting on the desk. The paper in his jacket felt like it weighed a tonne. But it was ready. By Saturday, he'd be in the air. They would be. Kaelin would land in London like he was arriving at home for the first time, and-- life would change.

He was reasonably on time when he arrived at the west balcony. Kaelin was already there, and met him with a bemused shrug that suggested this mystery message-- he'd forgot to check in the dash to Noin's office-- must not have been very detailed. He didn't quite manage to sit before Quat was answering his phone, and then said to him, 'Would you mind helping? The food's here.'

'Sure.' He rose again, but Kaelin waved him down, and left with Quat. Trowa propped the baby monitor on the table. L4's perfect weather seemed unperfectly warm, after his covert activity. He was hot under the collar. He reached for the water pitcher Quat had brought, and drank a large glass and half of another before the two men returned with the food. Chinese. The smell turned his stomach, salt and grease. He managed a smile that was something more than a spasm, and did his part setting out the plastic containers of soup and broccoli and shrimp toast. 'Still orange beef?' Quat asked him, but he didn't get the chance to answer. The french doors were opening again. Noin, and, behind her, Zechs. Quat greeted Zechs with a friendly wave, and his wife with a long solemn look. Kaelin gave one of those to Trowa, and he forced his shoulders up in a shrug.

'Thank you all for coming,' Quat said. 'Food, please. Sit, everyone.'

Noin looked nervous. She had it clamped down between set jaws, but she was studiously avoiding Trowa on the other side of the table, and she jumped when Zechs asked her what she wanted. Trowa wasn't any better, watching everything out of the corner of his eyes and trying to avoid catching anyone's gaze directly. They were both crazy. They probably smelled guilty. Trowa finished his water and poured another.

It took forever for everyone to settle. Kaelin, impatient and scenting a big announcement, broke the quiet first. 'Dad,' he said, 'will you just tell us whatever it is?'

Quat played with his chopsticks, then set them aside, then made like he would stand and then sat again. Trowa checked on the papers in his jacket, and sat on his hand.

Quat changed his mind again, and stood, but only to retreat to the balcony rail. He planted his hands on it, looking out over the spread of the city on the far side of the green Winner lawn, and no-one interrupted him, it was that still suddenly. He could all but hear Quat breathing, over there. He knew. Quat had to know. This was--

'I've resigned as CEO of Winner Enterprises,' Quat said.

Kaelin shot to his feet. Zechs pushed back from the table, wary and surprised. Noin looked like someone had shot her, her face drained of colour, her mouth hanging open. Trowa closed his eyes.

'Dad!' Kaelin was saying. 'How could-- what-- why the hell would you do that?'

'It seemed as equitable a solution as I could find.' Quat faced them finally, surrendering to their shock, calmer than anyone else. 'The shareholders were pushing new partners, which would have threatened my office anyway. Rather than waging a protracted war over something that was bound to be nasty and costly, I just decided to resign. They wanted me out. They can have it.'

'Quatre, are you sure,' Zechs began.

Then Noin was standing, too. The napkin in her hands was twisted so tight her hands had gone white. 'You can't do this to stop me,' she said.

Quat just nodded. 'I know. I didn't do it for that. Of course it was for that-- but not entirely. You were right. We've lost sight of those old dreams. The big dreams we used to have, the impact we wanted to have, the world of choices we had in front of us. I lost sight of it. Or I let WEI get in the way, I suppose, and that was a choice, too. So I've made a new choice. It's just a company. This is a marriage. This is a family. If I fail at that, I'll fail because the fault is in me, not because WEI took too much time or kept me away or interfered with our lives.'

'Quat, it's your company.'

'And you're my wife.' Quat didn't flinch when she did, but he wasn't breathing now, wasn't so much as inhaling, as if it would break him. 'And I don't believe in too late.'

Kaelin watched the byplay without comprehending a word of it. He shook his head, as if he were clearing it, and shook off Trowa's hand when Trowa reached for him. 'So that's it?' he demanded from his father. 'What about all this effort to get me working there? Why throw me at WEI if you were just going to give it all up?'

'I didn't know I was.' Quat broke his eye-lock with Noin to look at his son, licking his lips, shoving his hands into his pockets. 'It didn't have anything to do with that.'

'So what if I told you I wanted the company? What if Malcolm would have wanted it? We're just out of luck, because you got tired of it?'

'Kae,' Trowa said.

'Not out of luck,' Quat responded evenly, quietly. 'I've retained my majority shares. I still own the company, and that will be your inheritance as it always was. I've just resigned as the executive officer. They'll elect someone else-- they'll elect with my vote, not against it-- and I'll take over the office of charity affairs. And you can have as much or as little to do with the company as you like, whenever you like.'

'But the odds of them electing a Winner to CEO once you've given it up are gone, especially if I have to work my way up as just another--'

'Last year I couldn't even bribe you to come to a shareholders meeting.'

'That was last year!'

'So you've changed your mind?'

'I don't--' Kaelin swallowed hard on whatever he was going to say, then blew out an angry breath. 'I want the option. It was supposed to be my choice. What about my choice?'

'Kaelin, you're just upset.' Noin enclosed his arm in her hands. 'I know you've been enjoying Kamran's team, but that's so incredibly different from what your father--'

'I know it's different. I'm not an idiot.' Kaelin shook her off. 'I just want to know what I'm supposed to think that you'd dangle WEI in front of me and then yank it away because you're having an off day.'

'Yank it away?' Quat rubbed his eyes. 'Kaelin, if once in twenty years you'd exhibited even vague interest in WEI, I assure you I would have considered it.'

'I never realised there was a countdown!'

'That's enough,' Quat snapped, and maybe out of the sheer surprise of hearing his father raise his voice, Kaelin stopped mid-syllable. 'WEI isn't a toy. It's a responsibility. Knowing I need to be home, I can't promise to give everything WEI needs out of a CEO. And knowing you want to be a musician, Kae, that's the finest thing in the world, but it's not fair to the people at WEI to make them wait on your decision.'

'I can't believe you're lecturing me on responsibility. All I said is that—' Kaelin was struggling with it, trying not to look bad in front of company, but that was fury in his face, hurt and fury that wanted an outlet and knew every vulnerable spot in Quat's armour. He went slicing in without enough time to think about it, and Trowa saw it happening, saw the words on Kaelin's face before they came out in his voice. 'You of all people pretending this is about responsibility? Your entire life has been running away from obligations. You ran away from your father to fight in the war, you married Mom instead of Trowa, you spent half of my childhood in the office, and now you're running away from WEI. What's next?'

'Kaelin, shut up,' Trowa said.

Quat was pale too, now, and Kaelin wore a low blush of shame, knowing he'd gone too far. Quat licked his lips, and did it again, and pushed at his hair. 'I can see how you would think that,' Quat said finally, and cleared his throat when his voice came out hoarse. 'I thought and said worse of my father. Maybe it's a curse in our family. Hindsight. I freely admit I've made mistakes, Kae. I've missed more chances than I can count. But I've stood exactly where you've stood and I can tell you that you don't see those chances coming at you with instructions. If you deserved a better father, all I can say is that I'm sorry, and I will do anything I can do to be better. But we can start right now by ending this nonsense about WEI. I'm sorry you don't feel adequately consulted about this. But WEI doesn't really mean anything. It's just a company. Companies grow and change all the time.'

'So-- what was this little experiment about, then? You wanted me to give a year to the company. Why? I mean-- really? Did you want me to love it or hate it?'

'I just wanted you to do something with a little purpose. Music is a wonderful discipline, and you're bright and creative, but you never had to work for it. You may not believe me, but part of being a parent is ensuring your children are prepared for the future. That's what I want you to love-- being the best version of yourself that you're capable of being. I know how very capable you will be, Kae.'

'Then trust me. Dad--' Kaelin made a supplication with his hand, and Quat took it, wrapping it in both of his. 'Dad, I may be late in telling you, but I'm good at this. I want to know what else I can do.' Quat was troubled, and Kaelin pushed hard on him, pulling out every trick in his arsenal-- as genuinely impassioned as Trowa had ever seen him. 'Father, please. I can only have this chance if you help me.'

'Kaelin, none of this will matter when you get to London,' Noin was trying, overriding him, trying to capture Kaelin's eyes. 'Whatever happens or doesn't with WEI, you'll have the Orchestra, what you've always wanted.'

'I don't want to play in an orchestra, Mom, not right now at least.' Kaelin touched her cheek. 'I still love music, but not at the expense of everything else.'

'You've barely been with WEI a month. In six you might hate it, in a year you might not feel like you can easily walk away, and it's a slippery slope from there. I watched Quat go through it, too. You've got so much spirit--'

'If you really want this,' Quat said slowly, 'if this is truly what you want, then... I'll help, Kae.'

'Quatre!' Noin slapped a hand on the table. 'What's the point of giving it up if you just let it suck Kaelin in? This was never what we wanted for him!'

'He's old enough to decide for himself.' Quat smiled wanly at his son. 'I think I'm prouder of that than anything. When have we ever been able to make you do anything you didn't want to do, Kae?'

'Kaelin, you have to go to London. You'll always wonder if you don't sit for that audition. Trowa agrees, don't you, Trowa? By Saturday you'll have forgotten all about this--'

Kaelin was staring at her. He looked at Trowa, then, too, and Trowa looked at the table. Zechs sat with his hand at his chin, putting the pieces together, and grimacing already.

'I didn't tell you Trowa was going to London,' Kaelin said. He covered his mother's fingers on his arm, and slowly removed them. 'I didn't say if I was going with him. And I know I didn't say anything about the Orchestra.'

The gig was up. Kaelin was figuring it out, Quat was realising there was something going on, and Noin was giving it all away with a face like a tragedy, tears in her eyes and her jaw clenched. She sat down, hands clasped on the table. Trowa opened his coat, and took out the envelope. He tossed it to Kaelin. 'It seemed like a good idea,' was all he could say.

Kaelin scooped it up. The flight tickets fell to the table, and Quat picked those up. 'Lucy?' he asked, looking up at her. 'What is this?'

'Quatre.' Noin's shoulders slumped. 'Quat. I just wanted-- wanted for Kaelin to--'

'You were setting me up,' Kaelin surmised. He let the papers fall back to the table. 'I suppose I should be flattered. You put a lot of work into this.' He glanced at Trowa as he rifled a theatre guide. 'You, too.'

'Get you out of WEI before it swallowed you whole,' Trowa said. 'Although I can't remember now why I thought it would work. There's not a Winner alive who can resist the chance to lead a charge to the death.'

Kaelin scattered the papers with a sudden angry swipe of his hand. 'Dad pushing me at WEI, and when I finally want to be there, the two of you pulling me away from it. Did it occur to any of you to just _ask_ me?'

'You're too young to know just how quickly you can drown in deep water, kid.' Quat sat, slow going down, sliding the tickets between his fingers, as slow as if he were reading Braille for the first time, feeling out each letter. Trowa looked away. 'Everyone at this table but you has been there.'

Kaelin took the tickets. He put them back in order in the papers, tapped them into shape, and carefully folded them down. He set the envelope down, but his fingertips lingered on it. He picked it up again, and put it in his pocket. And then he left. He shut the door quietly behind him, and he was gone.

Quat stood. He was even quieter going than Kaelin. The door didn't even click.

Zechs put his hand on Noin's shoulder. She wiped her face. 'I'm sorry you had to sit through that,' she managed, rough-voiced. 'Please-- can I just call you in the morning?'

'Of course,' Zechs said. 'I'll be there. At any time.'

Trowa kicked his chair back. He drank the rest of his water, and picked up the bin of orange beef. 'I'm going to get drunk,' he informed the both of them. 'And give drowning another try. Call me if the sun explodes.'

'Go to hell, Trowa.'

'Hand in hand, partner.' He shoved his chair again, just to hear it scrape across the balcony tile. He let the door clatter closed behind him.

 

**

 

He went home. Kaelin never did.

He called. It went to voicemail. So did Quat's number. He didn't try Noin.

He gave it until midnight, and then he left.

 

**

 

He was in someone else's bed.

He had a muzzy impression of bright coral red. Everywhere. He dropped his head back to a pillow that was definitely fluffier than his regular pillow. It smelled like lavender. He was definitely in someone else's bed.

'Urgh,' he said.

Miraculously that must have translated, because someone-- there was someone else in that someone else's bed-- got up to close the curtains. The light fell to something less than the power of a thousand atom bombs on his eyelids, and he thought he might survive after all.

'Here.' He got a tap on the back, and forced himself into a cumbersome roll. He cracked an eye, which promptly watered, and he rubbed clumsily at it until it sort of worked. The smell of coffee helped. He reached with blind but unerring accuracy for the white mug hovering in front of his face, and drank it down to the dregs in gulp after gulp of glorious burn. Then he buried his face in the fluffy pillow again.

'You have a terrible head for liquor,' the someone else's voice said. 'Come on. Shower's ready. You'll feel better for it.'

'Urgh,' he answered.

Nothing for it. Strong hands flipped him, yanked him up by the armpits, and goose-stepped him across soft carpet into a bright torture room filled with steam. A glass door banged open, he stubbed his toe on a wet jamb, and then his head got shoved under hot spray. He gasped and thrashed, but whoever was holding him in place kept him there until he just sagged and sucked it up.

Slowly-- very slowly-- coherent thought began to emerge. He had a horrible headache. Awful. But the water was helping. He managed a step all on his own, and propped himself up on one of the glass walls of the shower cubicle. He directed the shower nozzle smack into his face, and rinsed his mouth with it too, getting rid of a rotten coffee-flavoured aftertaste. That helped. He fumbled around until he found soap, and that worked until he dropped the bar, and he decided it would just have to stay there. He stayed right where he was, for that matter, until the water started to run cold and the someone else came to get him.

Oh. The someone else was Zechs.

Oh and oh. He maybe possibly remembered how that had happened.

Zechs reached around him to cut the water, and wrapped him in a towel. Trowa pushed his wet hair out of his face, and ventured a croak of a greeting. 'Hey,' he said, and coughed into the towel. 'Um. We didn't, um. Do anything. Last night.'

Up close, the smirk he got in answer was mostly a blur, but he knew what it meant. 'No,' Zechs said. 'Which is not to say you're not a handful.' He covered Trowa's head with another flannel and gave it a vigorous rub, until Trowa swayed dizzily. 'I babysat you through the contents of our bar and then brought you back to the hotel, where you promptly passed out.'

Maybe not so promptly. He was fairly sure he remembered a sloppy kiss. That seemed to be a recent memory. Not good.

Zechs dumped him on a sofa outside the bathroom, and left him there with a moderately insulting pat on the head. Still, Trowa didn't move fast. Merquise disappeared back into the bath, and before long the shower was running again. Trowa gave it another minute before he shoved up to his feet, and another minute to be sure he would stay there. Nauseated, which spoke to just how much he'd had to drink the night before-- he had a very good head for booze, usually. He shuffled to his clothes, draped over a big leather chair, and sat on the floor to pull his pants on. Motor function suffering, but he'd thrown himself into action in worse condition, over the years. He got his arms into his shirt and figured that was close enough. He wobbled to his feet and followed his nose through the door to the kitchen.

Hotel suite. More atrocious decorating. Gold everywhere, and that ugly coral colour. Trowa shaded his eyes with a hand and yanked the curtains closed over the big balcony windows. Coffee. He poured a new mug, filled it to the brim to catch the last of the pot, and drank all of it in steady swallows. Better. Almost human. Not quite. He dumped the press, shook fresh grounds into the tank-- more or less into the tank-- and set it on the heat again. Then he bent over the sink, cushioned his head on his arms, and tried to decide if he had to puke.

'All right?' Zechs. Warm hands came down on Trowa's shoulders, massaging gently. 'You're a wreck. Come sit down.'

'Yeah.' He let Zechs push him around again, this time in the direction of the couch. 'Thanks. I don't think I behaved all that well yesterday. I think.'

'You did about as well as could be expected.' Zechs settled next to him, sifting his damp hair, bare skin glistening. Trowa looked, and caught himself looking, and supposed he was probably not going to die if he could still be turned on.

'Sorry anyway,' he said. 'In case you're protecting my honour more than I think you are.'

Zechs grinned, the smile spreading slowly over his mouth. 'Your honour is in tact. Do you think you can eat?'

'No. God.'

'Do you want me to escort you home? We'll have to pick up your car at the bar.'

He dropped his head back to the cushion behind him. The coffee was helping. He still had blank spots about the night before, but he had full memory of why he'd tried to obliterate himself. He said, 'Kae didn't call, did he.'

'No. I'm sorry.'

No. He hadn't really expected that. 'Quat.'

'No. No messages on your phone.'

It was pressed into his hand. He didn't look. 'I blew it.'

'It wasn't your best day.' Zechs sighed. 'You'll only be one of the family until a scene like that. Believe me, I understand.'

No shit. Trowa rubbed the hard plastic case of his phone, and shoved it into his pocket. He said, 'She had an affair. Did you know?'

'It wasn't that kind of affair.'

'It wasn't you.'

'Barton, this isn't going to be your best day, either.'

'Just asking.' He had to think hard about it before he could dredge up the willpower. 'It's not that it matters. Just that if Kaelin knew, he would've-- might've-- decided it differently.'

'Then why didn't you tell him?'

Because it wasn't his secret to tell. Maybe he should have done. But he hadn't. And if Kaelin still didn't know, Trowa still wasn't going to be the one to spill it.

Zechs clapped him on the knee. 'Let's get breakfast. You'll feel better.'

He did, in marginal increments that added up to a mild enough grump by the time he'd forced himself to eat two eggs and a big buttered muffin and a bowl of sugary fruit in syrup. Zechs put away twice what he did, blinding a shy waitress with a kindly white smile, and didn't push him for conversation. They left the cafe behind for a walk down the empty mid-morning streets, strolling slowly along in mutual quiet. Family. A tangled family tree, theirs. With a few grafts, a few blights, and a few parasites just to round it out.

He said, 'I tend to have-- inappropriate emotional reactions. Historically. Not exclusive to, but especially related to, Winners.'

Zechs chuckled easily. 'You do yourself a discredit. You care, Trowa. That's all.'

'I can't care and keep my nose clean.'

'So you're human after all.'

Ha. Maybe. The only one who'd ever questioned it was him. But that helped to hear.

They rounded the corner, which put their bar in sight. And his car, poorly parked over the line and sporting a ticket on the windscreen. 'Where to?' Zechs asked him then. 'You want some time alone, or shall I figure out what to do with you next.'

'I can manage it.' He pulled the ticket off and shoved it into his jacket. 'Thanks,' he said then. 'You're nicer than I deserve.'

Zechs kissed him. He didn't really see it coming, but it didn't even raise his hackles. Zechs stroked a line down his neck, and let him go. 'See you next time,' he answered, and left him there.

It was time he did something to earn all the goodwill he'd been given. Except for one minor problem. He didn't have his keys. He leant on the window to peer inside the car. Yep. Still in the ignition. Brilliant.

 

**

 

The plastic hide-away rock was still sitting there by the basement door. Trowa slid the key out, and swiped it over the lock reader. It buzzed green, and he let himself in.

It was quiet. No noise at all, not even an errant whiff of a television. Trowa knew well before he climbed the last stairs. The door was open. He pushed with just one finger, and it swung wide.

Quat was sitting in the rocking chair. The crib was there, but the mobile was gone, and the dresser next to it had drawers open, contents removed. The diaper bag was gone. The monitors.

'Hey,' he began, and couldn't get anything else out.

Quat looked up at his voice. He held a little blue slip of yarn. A hat. He rose, and set it down gently on the dresser. 'Well,' he murmured. 'That was a giant fuck-up, all said.'

Trowa cleared his throat. 'Yeah. Quat, I'm--'

'Don't say sorry.'

'I really am. Quat. I mean it.'

'I've said a lot of sorries over the years.' Quat sat in the rocker again, falling back into it in a deep slump. 'It's what you say when you can't fix what you've done.'

That wasn't an accusation. Trowa was prepared for it, but he knew the difference. He crossed the threshold, not without a moment of trepidation. The big foam floor mat as gone, and all the toys had been packed. The singing bee was laying abandoned beside the toy chest. Trowa sat next to it, tucking his feet under his thighs, and picked it up. The button on the crinkly foil wing made the bee hum and shiver. He turned it off again. 'Have you seen Kaelin?' he asked finally.

'He stays in his room, when he's here.' Quat brushed his hair out of his eyes, then closed them and propped his chin on his fist. 'I don't think he knows what to say. I don't think he knows which of us to blame.'

'All three of us.' He put the bee down. 'At least one thing went well.'

Quat read that far more accurately than he'd been doing. He let out a soft incredulous breath. 'You even dare to call me out? What did I do but exactly what Kaelin asked of me?'

'Which just so happened to coincide with what you've wanted him to do all his life. Timely.'

Quat sat up. His fingers tapped on the arm of the chair, then settled flat. 'You know what, I am happy. I'm happy my son has found something he loves and is good at. I wish it came with a family that could celebrate together without this shadow over us. But you're a part of that family, not because of what you and I had twenty years ago, but because Kaelin loves you. What you did doesn't have an excuse, not an iota of an excuse. So forgive me for not taking more responsibility for being a part of it. You didn't exactly compromise with him, did you? But why would you. You've never been one to give up ground before you're out of bullets.'

'Thanks for that brilliant summary of the Barton-Winner history. Only you left out the part where two generations of Winner offspring rationalised trading away love for a multinational corporation. Your father did his job well.'

'He didn't choose the job over you. You broke his trust. That's why he's angry.'

He crunched the foil wing of the bee in his fist. 'I get it. I'm not-- being sarcastic. I get that what I did was wrong. I didn't know-- I didn't know what it would do. To you... I knew it would hurt you, and I did it anyway. That's not even the worst thing. I didn't even think, didn't for a moment think what it would do to me and Kaelin if he ever figured out what part I was playing. So I'm stupid as well as selfish.' He had to make himself let go of the toy, smooth the wing out again. 'I want him to be happy. And he will be. Fine.'

'He'll be happier if there's someone willing to wait for him.'

'Maybe I'm just not willing to ride that train again.'

'What again? You gave up on me when I was fifteen!'

Trowa shrugged. 'Not really. I gave up on you when you married Lucy. You just didn't notice.'

'I didn't roll out of bed with you to walk her down the aisle. I married her three years after you walked away from me. And fuck you. I noticed.'

'Then like your son, you just didn't care.'

Quat levelled a finger at him. 'Stop it. You don't get to speak to me like that. Not after yesterday.'

It was getting hard to just sit there and breathe and swallow. And think. He'd told Zechs he had a history of inappropriate emotional reactions-- this was why. This was why, because Quat had made him into a real boy, but he'd always been wooden in his heart. How did someone normal deal with a mistake on this scale? He'd just helped break up a family. The last time he'd felt this gulf opening up in his gut he'd tried for a suicide run in his Gundam. He didn't have one handy, now.

'You—' He had to force air into his lungs to try it again. 'You should go to Earth. The longer she's away from you the more entrenched she'll get in her position. If you go there, confront her, she'll have to face it. You.'

Quat fell back in his chair, staring wearily at the window. 'What would be the point? She wants rid of me. Would it be cruel to force her to face me even in the last place she feels safe?'

'You don't believe in too late.' He set the bee on the floor, carefully. 'Noin never did, either. It was the one way you two were perfect for each other.'

'Trowa.'

'I'm the smart one, remember? I must be right.'

Quat looked at him. It didn't erase the sadness in his eyes. But it helped.

 

**

 

Step One. Don't Apologise. Fix It.

Kaelin did not answer his door. He definitely did not answer his door when Trowa announced who it was. He did make an appearance when Trowa broke in.

'What the hell?' Kaelin screeched at him. 'You broke my damn door!'

'It's your dad's door,' Trowa pointed out, and yanked the handle off before it could fall out of the wood scraps. 'And he has bigger things to worry about. Like you being an asshole.' He'd damaged the frame, kicking it in. Oh well. He'd pay for it.

'I'm an asshole?' Kaelin repeated, his voice going up an octave in direct proportion to the amount of self-righteous disbelief it was expressing. 'I cannot believe you'd so much as think those words in my direction after what you did!'

'Can we skip the yelling? My head is kind of killing me.' He dropped onto Kaelin's couch. 'I don't know why you're worried about the door. Have you seen this suite? You can't even throw out the dirty plates?'

Kaelin flushed. It put bright red spots high on his cheeks, highlighting the pinched white line of his mouth. 'I am not in the mood, Trowa,' he said.

'I've already been scolded, and I don't really care to repeat myself. So sit the fuck down and listen to me explain, or break up with me now, but that's about the options you have.'

Kaelin blinked. 'Are you--'

'Of course, if you break up with me, you'll have to move out. And cushy as it is here at your dad's, it looks like you have another week, max, before you'll be pretty much living in your own filth. And I'm sure you've got big plans to help your dad with the struggle he's got coming, but you have to actually sit somewhere near him to be supportive, and that requires getting your head out of your ass, so pencil in some time to spend on that operation, too.'

'Did I somehow wake up in an alternate universe? Because yesterday you were confessing to a giant conspiracy to--'

'It wasn't giant. It wasn't even wholly baked, apparently.' Trowa examined a sliver of dirt under his thumbnail, wondering what he'd done to put it there. 'And two people isn't really a conspiracy. It was a bad decision. I'm not going to defend it. But I am going to explain it, and you're going to listen, or there's not really any point in pretending to be a couple. Is there.'

Kaelin swallowed. 'You pick a funny time to start being the relationship expert.' He ventured nearer. 'So tell me. Are we a couple? Can we be, if you can do what you did?'

'You'll have to decide that.' Trowa put his elbows on his knees, squeezing damp palms together. 'So can I? Explain?'

'Now you ask?' Kaelin tugged at the hem of his vest. At last he sighed. He took the deep chair facing the couch, shoving a pile of shirts to the carpet. 'Talk,' he said. 'I promise to at least hear you out.'

Right. Trowa rubbed his mouth, trying to speak before the words evaporated. He'd had just about enough steam to get himself here, but it was drying up on him. 'We never talked. At length. About my relationship with Quatre.'

'I thought we agreed it didn't matter for us.'

'Day to day, no. But it had a lot to do with this debacle we just went through.'

Kaelin's face had no clues for him. 'Okay,' Kae said.

No words. He was about to go pre-verbal. He had to work just to get his tongue moving. 'Growing up. I didn't have-- you know, a family. Or friends. I knew it was out there-- that other people had it-- I just didn't. That was it. And then I met Quatre. Kaelin, the way you are-- you can never imagine. And I love that about you. I loved it about him. It never even entered his world that I might not immediately feel for him what he felt for me. But at the same time I knew he understood me. He never asked more from me than I could give. When I started to pull away, he didn't chase me. He gave me my space. And-- I don't know, maybe in a way I've always resented that he didn't force me on. Because then we'd be together. And we would have had a good life. I know that. Because Quat deserves a good life and I could've, I wanted-- to be part of it. But that's the thing about Quat. Even when we weren't together any more, I was still in his life. His friend. I'd never had a friend. I told him once I would do anything for him.'

'You have,' Kaelin said. He cleared his throat, shifted in his seat. 'He told me. When you and I were first getting together. He told me that you broke up with me, for him.'

'But it's not just Quat anymore.' This was the hardest. Harder than fake apologies. Harder than real apologies. You didn't leave your flank open. You never left your chest open. Your heart. Vulnerability was death. Or worse. You lived with it, with the hole it ripped in you. And that was it. There was no coming back from having your heart ripped out. 'I would do anything for you. Anything to protect you. Because the rest of the world isn't like you. The rest of the world is out to use you and hurt you. And if you don't protect yourself, you need someone-- I wanted-- I thought I was--'

'Stopping me from wasting my life at WEI.'

'You're so young, Kae. You don't understand how fast it all happens. One day you'll look back and you won't even remember how it felt to be twenty and have all these choices ahead of you. Like Quat. He thought he had an obligation. He thought he owed it. I've always thought his father must have been a piece of work, to get into Quat's head the way he did. Quat doesn't know how to hold anything back. But Quat is a great dad and here you are, about to go down the same path.'

'It's not the same path.' Kaelin sat forward, in a mirror of Trowa's pose, his hands clasped tight and his eyes serious and gentle. 'I don't want to be my father. I don't intend to invest my entire identity in WEI. But I also don't want to invest my entire identity in music. I don't want to be just what I do.'

'It's not enough to want it. You have to actively avoid it.'

'And you have to trust me to see it coming. Or at least trust me enough to talk to me, instead of manipulate and trick me. Or did you think I'd never realise it, when we got to London and just happened to walk in on orchestral auditions?'

'I don't know what I thought.' He closed his eyes and pressed his thumbs into his temples. 'I deliberately didn't think about it. It was just going to work. The end.'

'Okay.' Kaelin inhaled, exhaled; Trowa tried, and couldn't. 'Okay,' Kaelin said again. 'So that's the explanation you wanted to give.'

'Yes.'

'Okay.'

'So are we okay?'

Kaelin rubbed his hands slowly together. 'I think...'

That hesitation wasn't good. His gut was already twisted in knots. Now it dropped out from under him. He shoved to his feet. 'Right,' he said. 'See you whenever, then.'

'Trowa, sit the hell down.' Kaelin sighed. 'I love you. I'm so mad at you I want to kick the crap out of you.'

He shoved his hands into his pockets, fisting them down until his belt tugged at his hips. 'So what does that mean.'

Kaelin stood, too. He twitched at the collar of Trowa's wrinkled shirt, and then at Trowa's hair. 'How's Dad? I tried to talk to him this morning, but he said he wasn't ready. Mom...'

'Took off with Malcolm. It's breaking his heart.'

Kaelin looked away. 'She said she's been unhappy for a long time. I sort of knew-- they've been sleeping in separate rooms since before I left for school.'

'I'm not saying you have to take sides. You probably shouldn't; you're their kid, and it's not fair to any of you.' He dared to put his hand on Kaelin's waist, and Kaelin let him. He pulled, just a little, and Kaelin leant against him. 'But I know it would help if you spent some time with him. He says he wants to be alone, but he never does. He hates being alone.'

'I know.' Kaelin rested his head on Trowa's shoulder, but only for a moment. He straightened away. 'I think I need some time. To deal with all of this.'

'Time. Away from me.'

'Not so much as just needing to be here.'

'But I'm not invited to join you,' Trowa guessed. He rubbed the back of his neck, and took a wide step back. 'No, I understand. I do. It's time for you to be a family. Or a dad and a son. Which is good. For the two of you to be together right now.'

'For a few days. A couple of weeks, maybe. Until we know for sure what Mom is going to do.'

'Keep me up on how it goes.' He put his hands in his pockets again, hunched his shoulders. Made himself stop it, keep his head level. 'I might get out of town for a while. Clear my head.'

'Don't run away.'

'Promise.' He forced himself to smile. 'Really.'

'Trowa-- your methods suck. But I'm glad you care so much about me that you'd try to fuck everything up to save me.'

He kissed Kaelin's plump lower lip. 'Always,' he said honestly.


	4. Trowa

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _You're feeling sorry for yourself, that's all. It won't last and then you'll realise you've been doing fine all along. And when you don't, your friends forgive you anyway. It's been a humbling month for all of us._

Duo put a mug next to his chair. 'Sorry about the mess,' he said, with a tight mouth. 'You should've called.'

'Sorry.' It was tea, the string dripping down the side of the mug. He sipped it once and put it down. It tasted oddly greasy. 'It was sort of a last-minute ditch.'

'Your thing with the kid.' Duo sank onto his sofa, shoving half-heartedly at a pile of blanket and clothes. 'Kaelin.'

'Kaelin.' His throat was dry. He sipped the tea again. 'You earned it. Tell me you told me so.'

'Yeah.' Duo brushed at his dry hair, scraping it back from his forehead. There were deep circles under his eyes. And the loft really was a mess. A window was open and the fan was cranking, but the air was stale, dead-feeling. Trowa shifted on his chair. Duo wasn't looking at him, but staring at the wall.

'Noin left him,' he said finally. 'I don't know if you know yet.'

'What?' Duo's eyes found his again. He sat forward. 'What, she left?'

'And she took the baby.'

'Jesus.' Duo rubbed his mouth. 'God. Quat-- he okay?'

'How would he be okay?' He rolled the mug between his hands. ' I don't know how Kae is. But maybe Jamie could call him. Check on him.'

'Yeah. I'll ask him.' Duo sighed. 'Man. If they can't make it?'

'I know.' There was a long silence between them, then. Trowa didn't know what else there was to say without having to edge into the part he'd played in the entire fiasco, and he hadn't come all the way to L2 just to spill his guts. Duo hadn't been a part of it and didn't need to know more than what he'd already been told, for now at least. Jamie would probably hear it all from Kaelin. That was all right. It would get around in its own time.

But Duo was sitting quiet, too, and if it hadn't been such a heavy topic, Trowa would have thought he just wasn't paying attention. He was staring out the window, again. Just staring. Not tapping, not jiggling his knee, not chattering, not anything.

'You moving?' Trowa asked him finally.

Duo blinked. 'What?'

'Moving.' Trowa nodded at the boxes stacked in a corner. 'Getting a new place?'

'Going to Earth. Thinking of going to Earth.'

'You don't like Earth,' Trowa pointed out.

'I don't like anywhere.'

'Duo—' He was getting frustrated. It was getting surreal. 'Did you get a new job?'

'Was thinking I could hook up with Howard's old crew. They might have a place for me.'

'Out of the black? Duo, what's going on with you?'

'What, you care now?' Duo rose abruptly. 'Stick to what you're good at, Tro. You never were much for other people's problems.'

'That's not fair,' he said, stung by that. 'We're friends. There's back and forth.'

'Yeah?' Duo pulled a pile of books off the shelf and tossed them into an open box with a clatter. 'You know what I pay every month to support them, with Jamie making three times the money I do? You know why Hilde hasn't married this guy? She'd have to give it up. I'm late on a payment and her lawyer has some bully boy speak to my supervisor at work. You know what that feels like?' He tossed another handful of books, then dragged the box near and simply swept the rest of the shelf off with his arm. 'I'm a deadbeat dad. I don't have a fucking job and I know the name of every dealer on the entire satellite. That's what's going on with me. So either help me fucking pack or go home, Trowa, because I don't have time and I don't give a damn.'

'It's not like this shit just falls out of the sky, Duo. You didn't just stand there and get hit with a custody settlement or a bad performance review. You can take it out on me if you want, but it doesn't solve your problems. And if you fucking dare to put a needle in your arm I'll bring every last one of us here to beat the crap out of you.'

'Because I'm the only screw-up? You wouldn't know a real problem if it did fall out of the sky! You've had Quat running around cleaning up your crap for years, and all you had to do was wink at some hot teenager to get him all over you, and now you're sad because you might have to take responsibility for yourself? Quat's family is falling apart, and you're here? There's nothing to take out on you, Trowa. Shit never sticks on you.'

'At least I didn't peak at sixteen! I'm not a broke NA reject heading for forty with nothing to show for it but a two-minute wank over a Playboy!' He knew even before it was out of his mouth that he was going too far. He clamped his jaws shut, but it was already out there. They were both breathing hard. 'I'm sorry,' he said.

'Fuck off. Get the hell out.'

'Duo.'

'What, Trowa.'

Trowa inhaled. 'I'm sorry. For saying that. It's not true, and it was-- I'm just-- an asshole.'

Duo pulled at the base of his braid. Trowa watched his throat move, as he swallowed, watched his eyes close, then open deliberately again, deliberately level.

'Maybe it is true,' Duo said. 'I know a loser when I'm looking in the mirror. I had chances. This is what I did with them.'

'You can still be somebody. Anybody you want to be. Maybe just-- like you said. Get out of L2 for a while. Try a new place. New job.'

Duo sank down onto one of the boxes. 'I'm sorry,' he mumbled, and dragged both hands through his hair. 'I'm tired of this place. Of life. I didn't mean to be a jerk.'

Trowa stood. He reached for the roll of packing tape on the coffee table. 'I can ask around for you. On Earth. I know a-- I know a guy who's working in Brazil. You'd like it there. Sunny. Relaxing.' He folded down the flaps of the box, and taped them flat. 'I could go down there with you. If you want company.'

'Yeah. That would--' Duo cleared his throat. 'Be nice. If you got the time.'

He wasn't Quat. He didn't know how to hug, how to soothe. Duo was tense and avoiding his gaze, and he didn't know if he'd nailed that, with the offer to go to Earth with Duo, or if he'd just sounded condescending or something worse. Or if he'd been an idiot to offer help finding work. He already owed Zechs more favours than a man could repay, and this was a big, big favour he'd promised. Duo wouldn't hold him to it, that went without saying, but he'd put his foot in it anyway. God. He could use a little Quat, right now. He should have paid better attention all the times Quat had pacified him, over the years. It had certainly happened often enough. They spent more time doing that, for people who were supposedly friends.

'You're not--' he said, and wasn't sure how to finish. 'Don't-- do anything stupid. We'll go to Earth. Figure things out. There isn't any reason to-- act rashly.'

'I'm not gonna--' Duo sighed heavily. 'Drink?' he asked.

'God,' Trowa said. 'Yes.'

 

**

 

The shuttle trip was pretty crappy, even after Trowa upgraded their seats to business class. He came out of it feeling stale and dehydrated-- although that could have been the hangover. Duo, the bastard, slept the whole trip and woke up practically chipper. Trowa tried not to begrudge it-- the whole point was for Duo to feel better-- but when Duo smirked at him over his third cup of coffee, he thought hard about how polite he wanted to be.

Zechs met them at the port. In uniform. That was sort of disappointing, in the way of realising it wasn't going to be another Tahiti when he saw Zechs standing there in signature Preventers green. Duo was reserved, too, losing the thread of an ongoing joke about Brazilian waxes, locking down to a grim flat-lined mouth when he saw Zechs. They shook, and from the way Zechs raised his eyebrows, Duo gave him a good squeeze.

'I'm glad you rang,' Zechs said. 'I didn't expect to see you again so soon.'

'Can't stay away.' Trowa winced at himself. 'I mean-- you know.'

Zechs showed him just a glimmer of teeth in a grin. 'Car's this way,' he murmured.

The company car wasn't much, a functional little square of a thing that got good mileage and let the wind in. Trowa let Duo have the front seat, for the view, but that meant Zechs talked to Duo and no-one really talked to him. He napped, a little, while they battled through traffic around the port and onto the highways. He woke up in time to see the bridge to Zechs' little island, and rolled down a window to smell the ocean. Briny. Fishy. But also sun-baked and tangy and fresh. He sat up to check out Duo's face in the mirror flap. Duo had his eyes closed. Not asleep. A hand out the window, to catch the breeze, the sunlight. Eyes opening to look around with something like wonder, something like waking up after a long nightmare. Then he glanced up, and caught Trowa looking. He smiled.

'Trowa?'

Zechs, twisting around for a moment to look at him. 'Yeah?' Trowa asked, clearing his throat.

'I'm hoping you'll be all right with lunch in. I cooked a local meal. _Feijoada_.'

'Does it have meat?'

'Real meat,' Zechs answered gravely.

Duo put an arm across the back of his seat. 'You okay?'

'Yeah.' Trowa forced his mouth up in a smile. 'Meat. Good.'

'And then a tour,' Zechs said. 'I'll take you in to our offices, such as they are. It'll be deathly dull for you, Trowa, but I thought Duo might like to see how we operate. We're still a few weeks from interviews, but it would give you a leg up, to have a sense of what we do, what we need.'

'I can't say thanks enough,' Duo said, repeating himself for about the eightieth time since the port. 'I mean, for whatever, even just for the tour. Or the holiday around your place. I know you don't have any reason to help, so it's, you know, so huge for you to do this. Both of you.'

'Not at all. As far as I'm concerned, what's past is past.' Zechs pulled off the road onto a path that barely qualified as dirt. 'I can't make any promises, unfortunately.'

'No, I know.' Trowa watched the back of Duo's head. Duo's hand out the window, opening and closing on the sunbeams. 'A chance,' Duo said. 'I don't know if you can relate. Just-- having a chance. It means more than you know. You get suck in this place where you can't even-- you can't even talk about it because it's just so-- big. I wouldn't ever... I wouldn't ever have asked. Stupid, huh. I just... so I can't, I can't say thank you enough.'

Zechs gave him a long sideways look. Then he met Trowa's eyes in the rear-view. 'I can relate,' he said quietly. 'Well. We're here. Shall we all stretch our legs? I'll show you your room.'

Santa Catarina Island was pretty enough, Trowa supposed. It was all green rolling hills and dark blue water. Across the water, there was the mainland, the city, all white tall buildings standing up against the mountains. He'd really made a mistake, his first landing on Earth in the desert, when there were places like this in the world. Zechs' 'bungalow' was pretty enough, too, a triangular-shaped two-storey with a kitchenette and open porch on the bottom and a one-room bed atop. Zechs had strung up a sheet on a rod to divide the small space, and furnished his guests with cots that looked, to Trowa's practised eye, like Preventer-issue. A lot of effort for a last-minute drop-in.

He heard footsteps on the rickety staircase. Zechs, free of his jacket, the collar of his shirt unbuttoned. He joined Trowa at the window, pushing open the shutter to let in the breeze. 'Duo's gone down to the water,' Zechs mentioned. 'I told him we can dig up clams for dinner, or head to the local _comida por quilo_.'

'Thanks for doing this.' Trowa propped his elbows on the wide window ledge, cocked a knee against the wooden wall. 'For Duo. You don't know him from Adam.'

'If you can judge a man by what you have in common, then I might say I think I understand him. I felt that way, once. And my friends pulled me back from the brink, when I had done nothing to deserve it, when I felt I could never earn another chance at life again. I know you have, too.'

'You don't know that about me.'

'I remember you in Antarctica. Would you ever have thought the boy you were then could be the man you are now? Maybe the miracle is that Duo made it as long as he did before he allowed despair in.'

'Still. This is a lot to do, to help a stranger.'

Zechs mimed his pose, leaning over until their elbows touched. 'But I did it for you.'

'But you shouldn't have.'

'Afraid I'll call in payment?'

'I'm running up a steep tab.' He was uncomfortable, with Zechs' body heat right there against him, and comfortable enough to take that as its own warning. 'I don't-- want you to think anything-- that I--'

'I know.'

'Then why do you keep helping?'

'You keep asking. Although this time you did use the actual words.'

Now he was definitely uncomfortable. 'And you're only too happy to be of service. More of that “normal” schtick you've been acting?'

'A little further back.' Zechs sat on the edge of the nearest cot, relaxed back with his shoulders to the white-washed wall. 'Sometimes in life people reach out for no better reason than that you need it. Treize did so for me. Saved my life, protected my secrets.'

'And turned on you.' Trowa faced the other man, shoving his hands deep into his pockets. 'You didn't say such nice things about him at Libra.'

'We parted ways and philosophies,' Zechs admitted quietly. 'But all regrets aside, I've come to remember the friendship we once had. Without him, I would have died when my father's kingdom fell. And, of course, Noin. I know you never liked her, but without her, I would been a creature living for revenge, if I survived my own self-loathing. They instilled something more, something better in me. For no better reason than that I was there, and had no-one else to help me. And aren't you doing the same now, for Duo? Helping your friend?'

'I'm not that good a person,' Trowa said. He put his back to the wall and slid down, dropped his hands between his knees, stared at the joint in the ceiling and asked himself, really asked himself exactly what the hell he was doing. He'd only even gone to Duo because-- because he had wanted a whine, and if Duo hadn't been in the middle of a meltdown he never would've noticed. So he felt guilty and he felt bad about it, so he went dragging Duo out to who the hell knew where, on some slim hope that he was averting a disaster that might not have been so much a disaster as a bad afternoon, and that was to say nothing about the little pang of grief and relief he'd felt leaving L4's port, oh no, nothing to do with the way he'd watched the colony getting smaller in the window and thought to himself, uncensored and probably a little too honest, that he was glad to see the ass-end of that place.

'I'm not--' he said. 'I'm not that-- good of a person. Really.'

He stayed a week. He managed to have a good time, sort of, or at least to eat a lot. He tanned on the beach-- well, burned-- learnt as much Spanish as it took to make his way through the menu, and even helped Duo study the interview packet for Preventers. He was past age to be an agent, and there were certain legal difficulties involving past drug use anyway, but he was a shoe-in for applied sciences. They had a position coming open in a month, and Zechs generously offered to share his home until Duo knew whether he'd been accepted. Trowa thought it was rather a shame that Duo was utterly uninterested in what else Zechs had to offer. He could have used the kind of fantastic lay Zechs could give him. But that would have been a lot of hair in one relationship, anyway. At any rate, it looked like things would work out without his interference, which was probably a good thing. His success rate was pretty low, these days. He'd take one fragile victory and leave it well alone.

Duo hugged him at the port. What that meant, he didn't know, but Duo's eyes were red and he said something that sounded like 'thank you' before he got quiet and just nodded a lot. Trowa didn't do any better; he actually bumped his fist on Duo's shoulder, then stood there wondering why the hell he'd done that. He'd never bumped a fist on anyone in his life. But Duo hugged him again, and then they called for his boarding, and he grabbed his bag and grunted good-bye in a weird macho voice he'd never used before, either. He ground his jaws.

Zechs didn't hug him, but mostly because this time he was forewarned, and he reared back at the first twitch. So Zechs shook his hand instead. 'Call the boy,' he said.

'You call the boy.'

'Trowa.' Zechs smiled at him. 'Don't be miserable out of spite. It's a bad look on you.'

He was seated exactly halfway down the rows. There was an older woman in the seat next to him, wearing earplugs and studiously ignoring the other passengers. Trowa stashed his bag in the overheads, belted it down, and settled himself in for launch. He put his head back on the support and tried to decide between sleep and ordering a drink.

He pulled his phone out of his pocket. He scrolled his numbers, hesitating on one, trying to decide and failing. He drew a deep breath, and pressed a button. He put the phone to his ear.

It rang. Rang again. Then, _'This is Noin. Leave a message and I'll get back to you.'_

Just as well. His heart had started beating faster without even hearing her voice live. Better not to even have to imagine what he would have said. What he could have said. Nothing. There was nothing to say to her that would fix anything at all.

The next number was even harder. His thumb hovered over it for a long minute, two minutes, because hard as it was to think of talking to Noin, it was exponentially harder to think about her son. What he was doing. Whether he was okay. If he wanted to hear from Trowa at all, or if it was-- over.

He didn't call. He put his phone away and he closed his eyes and he slept for the rest of the trip.

 

**

 

Given that he'd chickened out on the phone call, he was rather surprised to find Kaelin waiting for him at the L4 port.

'Mr Merquise rang,' Kaelin said. He took Trowa's bag and slung it over his shoulder. 'Why are you peeling? What happened to your love-affair with sunblock?'

It took his mouth a minute to catch up with his brain. 'Uh,' he said. Then, more coherently, 'Wait, Zechs called you?'

'There were a lot of calls, actually.' Kaelin pointed, and then Kaelin sighed and started walking. Trowa got that hint, finally, and followed him quickly past the gate. 'We had ourselves a little manhunt,' Kaelin was saying. 'Jamie called me last Tuesday trying to find out what had happened to his dad. When we couldn't find Uncle Duo, we went looking for you. When we couldn't find you, we called Uncle Wufei, but he hadn't heard from you, but he called Uncle Heero and Aunt Sylvie, and she thought of calling Aunt Relena, and Aunt Relena thought of calling Mr Merquise. Who, apparently, had you and Uncle Duo as guests.'

'It was sort of an off-the-cuff visit.' Kaelin's hand was dangling at his side. Musician's hands, hands like Quat's, long-fingered, slim palms. Trowa almost took it in his. Habit. He stopped himself.

'Jamie was really worried,' Kaelin said. 'So was I. I thought-- I sort of figured you would let me know.'

'I told you I might leave town,' Trowa defended himself. 'I'm positive I said that aloud.'

'Town, not the colony. Space.'

'I didn't, you know. Go there to be with Zechs. If that's why you're being weird and judgmental.'

'I'm not either.' Kaelin made such a brisk turn around a corner that Trowa almost lost him for a moment. He stepped double-time to keep up. 'But you're obviously aware how it looked,' Kaelin added, tightly, defensive himself.

'I went because--' But there wasn't much more to explain. It was a private thing between he and Duo, not a thing that needed to be shared around a group as large and incestuous as their over-large 'family'. Uncles and aunts and kids and, ultimately, Hilde, and Trowa didn't want to step in the middle of a domestic dispute that was every bit as old and damaging as what was going on with Quat and Noin. It wasn't Kaelin's fault that he was twenty years too young to know anything about it.

'Duo needed a friend,' he answered finally. 'It wasn't about anything but that.'

Kaelin looked at him. Then turned his face forward, in time to step onto the rolling walkway up the concourse. 'I've always loved the way you don't give a crap what anyone else thinks. Except for when you don't give a crap what I think, and then I hate it.'

'I don't give a crap.' Really, Kae had walked right into that. And Kae gave him an aloof sideways look, rolled his eyes on cue, but the corner of his mouth twitched up.

'Do you want to get right home?' Kaelin asked him then. 'I can drive you. Or if you're hungry, we can go out for dinner.' Kaelin took his hand, and squeezed it. 'I'll pay.'

'Wow. Never thought I'd hear those words.' He wet his lips, and started to speak, but they reached the end of their walkway just as he was about to form the words. They stepped off together, but he lost the rhythm, and forgot exactly how he'd wanted to say it. 'Um,' he said, 'how's your dad.'

'He's okay. More or less. The Board tried to screw him. They still want him to sell shares, and they're getting nasty about it. But I think he's doing all right. Mr Jamshidi has been helping. I think Dad wants him to be the new CEO, but I think they'll want someone from Earth. New face of business. It's too early to tell.'

'Any word from your mom?'

'Not yet.'

He wasn't sure what the yet meant. Hope. He hoped not wasted hope. Noin wouldn't give up on Kaelin. She loved the hell out of him. 'She's probably busy, getting settled.'

'Probably,' Kaelin said. He nodded to the big bay doors. 'I'm parked in the hourly lot. Dinner?'

'Kae-- are you sure about this?' He was calling himself stupid before he even let it out of his mouth, but it had to be asked. 'This seems a little like the relationshippy stuff you put on hold a week and a half ago. I'm not sure a week and a half is really enough time to totally re-evaluate-- things.'

'It's not,' Kaelin agreed, and kept walking, and since Kaelin also didn't let him go, Trowa got pulled after him. 'But do you know?' Kaelin added. 'It turns out I can multi-task. I told you we weren't breaking up. Why don't you ever believe me?'

'Because you're twenty-two.'

'That's not really a condition I can do anything about except wait. Though it seems worth noting that there are a lot of shades to how a thirty-eight year-old behaves around here.' The doors whooshed open for them, like they'd been blown open by the sheer force of personality stalking through. Kaelin didn't so much as look around for traffic before stepping off the kerb and heading for the lifts. Still with a deathgrip on Trowa's hand. 'I don't think anything is helped by you disappearing. Dad misses you. I miss you. And there's a weird smell in your apartment. And speaking of apartments, we really need to talk about whether you were serious about moving or whether that was part of the gigantic scam you've been running this last month.'

Your apartment. He heard that little nugget, buried innocuously in the rest of that. Yours, not ours. 'Kaelin.' He tugged, then just stopped moving, and Kaelin rebounded at the full extension of their arms and swung back to face him. 'I don't object to talking for however long it takes. I just don't want to do it if it's ultimately going to be for nothing.'

Kaelin's finger trailed down his chest and snagged in a button on his shirt. 'Did you tan with your shirt off?'

'Kae.'

'Trowa. I'm not saying either of us knows exactly where this ends.' Kaelin slipped the button through its hole, and opened Trowa's shirt enough to reveal a strip of skin. 'I am saying that working it out will take both of us. Here. In one place. And I think we need to start at a place of mutual understanding and comity.'

_'Comity?'_

'It means recognising the validity and effect of--'

'I know what it means. I don't know what legal reciprocity has to do with--'

'It's a metaphor, you jackass. We start off by admitting that we each have valid points and we give each other credit for everything that brings us to this point. All right?'

'All right.' He caught Kaelin's hand when it went for another button. 'What does comity have to do with undressing me in public?'

'If it's the public part that bothers you,' Kaelin said, 'then I have an easy solution.'

There was a weird smell in his apartment. He hadn't remembered to take the trash out before jaunting off to Brazil for a week. And his mail had piled up, spilling all over the foyer from the slot in the door, and his kitchen light fritzed out when he flicked the switch, but on the whole those were momentary distractions, because the second he closed the door, Kaelin took him by the jaw and tried to find his tonsils with his tongue. There were a number of salient reasons not to let that go on, but he didn't get very far with logic. He wanted it. Kaelin. It had been weeks since they'd actually slept together, going well back to before the Winner Enterprises fiasco, before Quat had suddenly become a single dad, before Duo had reached the end of a bad run and before Trowa had tried to interject himself into all of those things which didn't fundamentally need interference from an outsider. Outsider. Maybe, at the core of it all, that was why he'd been so alarmed by it all. The only place he'd ever really fit on L4 was in bed with Kaelin. And there wasn't any good excuse for reacting completely out of proportion except that he wanted to be here. He really wanted to be here, whatever that meant, and he'd been scared of losing his place.

Kaelin sucked on his lip, drifted in slow biting kisses down his neck. Trowa fingered tight black curls, stroked down the indent of Kaelin's spine, down the curve of his ass. Kaelin leant a heavy head on Trowa's collar, eyes low on his fingers as he unthreaded Trowa's belt, popped the button of his jeans, and dragged the zip open. Kaelin kissed the underside of his jaw, and said, 'You didn't make the bed before you left. Sloppy.'

No. He hadn't. The sheets were a little stale, but they'd been clean recently enough, with no-one to sleep in them for a week. He reclined when Kaelin pushed him, propped himself up on an elbow to watch Kaelin draw the blinds, close the bedroom door. 'Should I ask again if you're sure?' he said.

Kaelin pulled his jumper off over his head. 'Trowa,' he answered, 'now is not the time for words.'

He wasn't the only one who'd needed it. They made it barely five minutes before Kaelin curled tight against him with a gasp and shuddered into silence. Trowa gritted his teeth, the magic of being thirty-eight, and held back, grinding his jaws until he could breathe again without exploding. He'd never even made it out of his trousers. Kaelin was still kissing him, kissing his chest, mouthing at his nipple, and Trowa stayed flat on his back waiting for a sign that it was okay to move. Waiting. Waiting, while Kaelin squirmed around on top of him, his bare ass cheeks rubbing on Trowa's hard-on and hands rubbing through his hair, drifting caresses that refused to travel south. But he didn't speak. Comity. Mutual understanding.

He knew when Kaelin made up his mind. No words necessary. Kaelin just reached back, took him in hand, and slid down, and Trowa went up in flames. Kaelin perched on his lap with perfect balance, spine loose, fingers trailing the hair of his chest, and kissed his palm. Trowa curved his hand to Kaelin's cheek. He let Kaelin fit his fingers around Kaelin's prick, let Kaelin show him how he wanted it, slow, hard. Hard to hold it in, so he closed his eyes, concentrated on the bunching and releasing of Kaelins' thighs on either side of him, on the hot weight on his gut, the tight grip of Kaelin's body. Kaelin asked him something, he thought, an echoy far-away question that he just nodded mindlessly yes, and he felt Kaelin's mouth on his, holding him together when he finally flew apart.

 

**

 

He didn't want to call right away, in case Quat was busy with work, but given the gossip network in place on the colony, it maybe wasn't so surprising that Quat found him instead.

He was outside trimming the bushes in L4's bright solar daylight. He bent down to grab his sweating beer for a swallow, and when he looked up, Quat was standing there. In blue jeans. Actual blue jeans. Trowa choked a little and had to wipe his mouth. He hid a grin behind the bottle.

Quat said, 'You've missed this big fuzzy patch here.'

'I'll go back for it.'

'Pass the shears. I'll get it.' Trowa reached over the hedge and handed them over, point aimed safely down. He held on for just a moment longer when Quat took them, and Quat's smile spread into a slow, familiar grin. But it faded, and left him looking weary, and sad. Trowa rubbed his nose, and let go of the shears.

'Haven't you a lawn service?' Quat asked him, and stepped two feet sideways to trim down a branch.

'There's a guy who plants things. If we want more than that, it's up to us.'

'A little cheap, isn't it.' Quat pulled the branch free and kicked it out of the way, propped the shears on his shoe. 'You have any tea in there?'

'You know I do. Guess I can take a break. C'mon in.'

It was cooler inside, but not by much. L4 had entered summer. He splashed his face from the sink tap, and filled the kettle too. He had to dig around a little in the pantry to find it, but it was still where he'd left it from Quat's last visit-- a tin of expensive black tea. He dropped it onto the counter and put a mug next to it.

'Thanks.' Quat propped himself on a stool at the bar, put his chin on his fist. 'Milk?'

'It's not new, but I think it's still fresh.' The expiry date on the bag was a few days out, still. He pulled out the jug for Quat to use. 'You mind if I have some, too?'

'Please.'

He liberated another mug from the tree. The stool next to Quat was open, but he couldn't bring himself to sit on it. He stayed on the kitchen side of the counter, fiddling with tea bags, and yanked the kettle off the base as soon as it started to boil. 'To what do I owe the visit?' he asked finally.

'Taking a day,' Quat said, and sipped his tea. 'You?'

'I had two weeks off from work.'

'The time you were planning on having Kae off in London.'

He looked up. Not a tease. Not even a swipe at him. Just an observation. Quat had little lines by his eyes, creases that went deep as he stared down at his tea.

'Yeah,' he said. 'So I figured I'd just finish out my time off. Do some chores. Catch up on television.' He wiped a flannel over a non-existent spill on the counter, and found a spot to stand that didn't feel too exposed, in the corner between the stove and the fridge.

'Did you see Kae?' Quat asked then.

'Yeah. He picked me up at the port.' He dunked his teabag a few times, and set it aside. 'He looks good.'

'There's been a lot of rapid movement at WEI. Kamran signed him on for a permanent position. It's a stepping stone. He'll stay there for a year, then start rotating through departments for our-- their management training programme. If he does well with that, and I think he will, he'll be in a good spot five or seven years from now.'

'Good spot to do what? Take over the company?'

'No. They won't let that happen again, not after all these years stuck with me; they're done with under-educated young men without the experience to step in and lead. But he'll come into his major trust at twenty-five, and he can buy me out of my shares then, if he likes.'

'Buy you out.' He tried his own tea, and put it down after just a taste. Beer was better. 'So,' he said. 'You going to retire then?'

'I'm moving to separate the charitable arm of WEI. I know I can bring the legal team. Digging out the tangles in the money will take some doing, but I have time and energy on my side.' Quat turned his mug in slow circles. 'I slept til seven. Me. Three days in a row.'

'That's good. You earned it. You worked hard for it.'

'So will he.' The mug made one final round-about, and sat still between two hands. 'He wants it. He told me not to fuss, really. I--' The words stopped flowing. Quat wet his lips, and stopped himself with a small inhale.

Trowa let out a breath, himself. 'I believe he does, Quatre. More than you ever did.'

'He's only twenty-two. How can he know anything.'

'You were fifteen. Drink your tea.'

Quat cleared his throat. He lifted his mug, got it halfway to his mouth. He put it down, and fluffed his hair instead, scratched at his neck. Trowa moved without thinking, caught his hand before it could make a red mark. He buffed Quat's nails with the pad of his thumb.

'He knows what he wants,' Trowa said. 'He'll be happier with his choices than we were. You raised him to know himself. Kind of a miracle. He does.'

'Have you sorted with him? Kaelin?'

Trowa shrugged one shoulder. 'I talked to him.'

'What'd he say, then.'

'That he's sure of this.'

Quat closed his hand around Trowa's fingers. 'He was sure of you, once.'

'Yeah. But he's thinking with the right organ now.' Quat slipped a smile, and Trowa returned it. 'He won't be alone forever.'

'And you?'

It almost didn't hurt to speculate. 'I'm good where I am. He'll let me know.'

'Zechs is coming for a visit in June.'

'Don't you dare.'

It wasn't quite a smile. It disappeared too quickly. Quat pushed his cup at Trowa. 'Give me a refill.'

Trowa moved for the kettle and dripped water into Quat's cup. 'What about Noin. Lucy. Have you spoken to her since...'

'No.' Quat shook his head, a sharp little negation. 'I rang her parents. They admitted she was there, but nothing more. I didn't want to put them in the middle.' He was silent a moment, while Trowa watched him. 'My mind is in two places. Tomorrow, what's going to happen tomorrow, and-- and how everything I thought was going to happen a year from now is now not going to happen like that, and it's-- unimaginable, but it's not stopping my brain from trying.'

'It's a lot to process. And all at once. You need a little time.'

Quat waved him off. 'Just rambling. I'm sorry. I didn't come here to do that. Just to check in. Say hello. I've missed you lately. I thought we were growing closer. I trust you weren't faking that.'

'Quat.' He did some neck scratching of his own, then. 'I hope-- that you know—'

'I do. I'm sorry. I shouldn't make fun of you. You just... suck at expressing yourself.'

And how. Didn't have words for what he wanted to say now, either, which was sort of that 'Are you sure?' question he'd had for Kaelin, and sort of that 'Don't do anything stupid' notion he'd had for Duo, and a weighty addition of all the times he'd wanted to say 'love' to this man and hadn't been able to. He made a noise that petered out before it quite passed his lips, and Quat smiled at him again.

'I know,' Quat said.

'Did you want me to try calling her? She might talk to a neutral party. Not neutral, but she's probably pretty mad at me, so maybe I can trick her into picking up to yell at me. And then trick her into coming home.'

'No, truly. But thank you for offering.' Quat patted his hand on the counter. 'Tell me about Duo. He's all right? Jamie was upset.'

'He's on his way to all right, I guess.' He knew a subject change when he was run over with one, but it was hard to grudge it. Duo was a safer topic. 'He just needed to get away. There's a position opening up in Zechs' unit in Preventers.'

'Preventers? He was never interested in Preventers.'

'Sometimes a radical change is what you need.'

'I'm glad he was open to you. He respects you.'

'He respects all of us, Quatre.'

'Yes, but he listens to what you say. We all do, but you know what I mean. You're the one who always figures it out. You know what people need.'

'Like hell I do.' He shoved his tea at the sink, and it fell over, but that just made a better excuse to open the fridge and pull out another beer. 'Honestly-- honestly, can you point to one thing I've done right in years? I haven't-- I feel like-- I feel sometimes like I just reel from disaster to disaster and if things shake out at the end, it certainly isn't to my credit. I just contributed to your divorce, I just dropped Duo out of one bad situation into another where he probably won't get a job and probably won't be any better off than he was before, except now he's on Earth instead of L2. Kaelin comes over here to f--' He stopped himself from that confession just in time, while Quat's eyebrows climbed. 'Fucking talk,' Trowa said. 'He says we're not breaking up but he's not moving back in, and I guess I have to be okay with that because it's my fault we have to be talking about it at all. I found nine different ways to screw Zechs in one week, and for some sick thing about Treize Khushrenada he's still being nice to me. And--'

Quat stood. Trowa shut up. 'Stop flinching,' Quat said, and kissed him gently on the cheek. 'You're feeling sorry for yourself, that's all. It won't last and then you'll realise you've been doing fine all along. And when you don't, your friends forgive you anyway. It's been a humbling month for all of us.' He tugged at Trowa's cowlick. 'Drive me home. I'll cook you dinner. We can catch up on television together.'

They made it as far as ice cream in Quat's kitchen. Gelato. They pulled eight cartons out of the freezer, hazelnut and pistachio and amaretto and about a billion other nut-flavours. 'Weird,' Trowa said, and Quat rolled his eyes expressively, then caught himself on a sad note. Trowa did the first thing right in a long time: he got a spoon and he shut up.

'You ever find out?' he asked eventually.

'What did I find out?'

'If you have diabetes.'

'No.' Quat licked his spoon clean of Candied Chestnut and dipped right for Macadamian Delight. 'Fit as a fiddle. But I did lose three kilos when we cut sugar.'

'You didn't need to. You look good.'

Quat gave him a sly look. 'Whichever one of you does the cooking could stand to cut back. You used to be so slim.'

'Yeah, when I was a teenager. I started working out when I worked at the circus.'

'No, I do remember that. You showed up suddenly so buff. Shoulders like this.' Quat mimed with cupped hands. 'And those short unis of Barton's really showed you off. You looked like a beaver scout who'd had one of those comic book accidents. Bit by a radioactive spider and suddenly you sprout muscles all over.'

'Har har.' Trowa curled his spoon through Chocolate Marzipan, peeling up a thin leaf of gelato. 'I can go you one worse. I still have pictures of the year you tried to grow a beard.'

'Low blow!'

'The right cheek filled in faster than the left. And you had about six hairs on your upper lip.'

'How was I to know until I'd tried it? My father had moustaches from age eleven on.'

Trowa snorted into his elbow. 'Sorry. The image that gave me. A little mini-Quatre with these giant handlebar--'

'Quat.'

That wasn't him. Trowa twisted to look.

Noin.

Quat had gone still. Trowa started to stand, then thought maybe he'd blend into the background better if he just stayed where he was. Noin was still wearing a travel coat, had her collar turned up, her hair a little lank from being slept on. There were dark circles under her eyes, and she wasn't wearing lipstick, making her look paler than normal. But Quat, judging by the way he stared, didn't see any of that. There was hope in his face, painfully sharp, and how he held it in, Trowa couldn't tell. The silence just went on and on, stretching out thin as a flat note.

Then the lump on Noin's chest emitted a tiny whine, and began to cry.

Lump. Baby. In a dark sling. Noin broke the eye-lock on her husband, and pulled back the fabric of the sling. Malcolm. 'He was so good during the flight,' she stuttered, fumbling to hold him. Then Quat was there, without so much as touching the kitchen tile in between them.

'Please,' he begged her softly. 'Let me.'

Trowa swallowed down the tightness in his throat. Do it, God, he thought. But Noin didn't need direction from him. She was already handing Malcolm over. Green onesie, the one with the frog feet, and a little bonnet that slipped and fell off in the hand-over. Malcolm was getting red in the face, working himself up to a lusty wail, but quieted with a hiccough and a yawn when Quat laid him up on a shoulder. Quat's eyes filled, Trowa saw that even sideways and pretending to stare at the ceiling. Quat cradled his son, then put out an arm and pulled Noin close. Trowa looked away for real when they kissed.

'I tried to stay mad,' Noin whispered behind him. 'I just missed you more.'

'We'll work it out. We'll get counselling, we'll get help, we'll--'

Trowa left his spoon in the hazelnut. He didn't look back. He left through the back door, and made sure it didn't swing hard when he closed it.

 

**

 

Somewhere between the fifth beer and the sixth, Trowa wrote a list for himself. It was still pasted onto the stainless steel door of his refrigerator with peanut butter when he stumbled into the kitchen in the morning.

He fumbled the coffee pot into life and only knocked one mug off the tree before grabbing the one he wanted. It was possibly self-destructive, to drink alone at night. If for no better reason than he couldn't find the aspirin. He sat at his counter and fidgeted with that fancy tea tin of Quat's.

Hoped Noin had stayed. Hoped they hadn't gone off to separate bedrooms again. How was that for true love. An affair, years of drifting apart, and in the end all it took was ten days away for Noin to rank her priorities. There was something to that. Figuring yourself out took a lot of effort and a lot of waking up hard. Radical change.

At one and a half cups of coffee he felt ready to face that list. He left the stain of peanut butter on the fridge and sat down with the list. Shopping receipt, actually, with pen scratch on the back. And he apparently wasn't a very good speller, between beer and staying up all night.

_Step 1: apolgise for being asshet_

Well. That was familiar. He'd crossed out whatever Step Two was, obliterated it off the paper. But Step Three looked pretty salient.

_Step 3 stop being asshat DO BETTER_

It was good to have a plan.

He worked out for a whole hour in the gym, gave himself a long shower, trimmed his hair over his sink, even remembered to break out the dental floss. He chose his clothes with more than the usual care, pulling the tag off a new pair of denims, tucking in his shirt, taking the time to buff his lone pair of loafers. When he checked the final product in the mirror, he congratulated himself on a job well done. No sullen slouch, not now. He smiled at his reflection, his mildest, most pleasant smile, and felt he was ready.

Considering that all of his major relationships had revolved around the Winner family history, he'd never actually visited the L4 offices of WEI. They were nice. Of course they were nice; Quat wasn't the usual sort of corporate psychopath. The walls were all soothing shades of blue or green, there were live trees in terrariums and everything smelled like peppermint. The carpet was plush and refreshingly non-industrial. The cubicles were probably inevitable, but they were short enough to see over from a seated position, and he heard both radio and television playing from various points. The positivity was a little cloying. Four people asked if they could help him before he even made it past the lobby, and three more hit him up in the lifts when they spotted his visitor badge. He felt edgy, wishing for the bland, vague hostility of Preventers HQ, where people looked at you with a reasonable suspicion and kept to themselves. He understood better now why Duo had never asked Quat for work.

He'd never actually listened to the name of Kaelin's department, so he went by the one name he did know, Quat's cousin Kamran Jamshidi. He found Jamshidi's office on the sixth floor, behind a big glass wall with embossed words like 'Question Your Assumptions!' and 'Consider The Client'. There were no doors-- of course-- just a big portal through the glass wall. Trowa gave the edges a wide berth, and stepped through.

It was a big open floor. Of course. The ceiling had all kinds of crap hanging from it, models and antique neon signs and fairy lights and all kinds of nonsense. Creative minds at work seemed to equal clutter, in Trowa's wary experience. There were tables with computers, a lot of leather bean-bag chairs, a couple of beds even by the wall, complete with snoring occupants, though it was pushing eleven in the morning. Trowa stopped to look at a diagram drawn in marker on the biggest dry-erase board he'd ever seen. Code for pattern-recognition for geometric constructs in molecular science. It looked interesting enough. He smiled to see Kaelin's handwriting dominating a project map on the right-hand side.

'Can I help you?'

Trowa turned. 'Yeah.' He cleared his throat. 'Um, looking for Kaelin Winner.'

'Off taking a shower.' The man was his age, at least, a little older. And had the signature Winner blond-- along with a beard Quat could envy. 

'You'd be Kamran,' Trowa guessed.

'I am.' Jamshidi offered a hand before Trowa even got around to opening his mouth to introduce himself. A Winner, all right. 'You're a friend of Kae's?'

'His boyfriend.'

'You're Trowa.' Kamran broke into a grin. 'Well. Pleasure to meet you face to face. I've heard a lot about you, over the years.' Trowa hunched his shoulders, and let that one pass. 'Make yourself at home. I'll let Kae know you're here.'

'Thanks.' There were a couple of young folk sitting at one of the computer stations, tossing a football between themselves as they talked quietly. Trowa looked for a chair, and couldn't see one. No way in hell was he going to sit on one of those bag things, even if it was leather. He ended out propping himself on a table ledge, poking through a pile of printed pictures. Dirigibles. Why they had pictures of airships, he couldn't fathom.

'Spaceflight.' Kaelin. Smelling fresh, his wet hair curlier than normal. He picked up a picture with the tips of his fingers, lifting it for Trowa. 'If you can build a ship that holds hydrogen, you can build it to hold other gasses. They could be useful for unmanned deep space exploration.'

'Uh huh.' Trowa put his bag on the table. 'I brought you lunch.'

Kaelin sat on the table, too, around the corner from Trowa. 'You didn't cook it?'

'No, I didn't cook it. It's your favourite Indian restaurant.'

'That's nice of you, then.' Kaelin poked through the bag, and pulled out the papadums. 'Not to sound ungrateful, but why are you here?'

'Just checking in,' he said. 'I know you didn't go home last night. I wanted to be sure you'd heard about your mom.'

'Mom? What about her?'

'She's back. Came in last night. I figured maybe they'd be a little busy reconciling.'

'Not so busy they didn't tell you,' Kaelin grumped. He bit down hard on a cracker, and shattered crumbs over his clean shirt. He gave them a swift irritated swipe.

'I happened to be visiting when she got in.' He got a patch of sesame that Kaelin had missed. 'You missed the big word there. Reconciling.'

Kaelin relented. 'If that's for real, then that's good.'

'I don't think “real” or “unreal” are the worrisome parts, at the moment. More like “day to day”. But it is a good thing. I'm sure they'll call you soon. Fill you in.'

'Thanks for telling me.' Kaelin went fishing in the bag again, and came up with the mango lassi. He swirled the straw around in the cup and sucked hard at it, eyes on Trowa. 'You could have told me all that in a text.'

'But then I wouldn't have been able to bring you lunch.'

'Trowa, if this is because--'

'It's because I love you, and because I'm sorry, but more love and less sorry. Or more sorry and less love, depending on what you'd rather.' He took a papadum for himself. 'But definitely love and sorry.'

'I don't think you've ever said either of those words that many times in one day.' Kaelin sucked on his lassi again, but his cheeks were faintly pink, suddenly, and he looked a little flustered, of all things. 'What's got into you?'

'Did some thinking. About things that I do, instead of things that happen to me.' Just as well no-one was paying any attention, not even Jamshidi, who'd disappeared somewhere. Trowa barely got it out as it was. Too many years of guarding it all, keeping the cards so close to his chest he forgot what suit he was playing. 'Us breaking up or even just drifting apart-- that's something we do, not something that happens to us. So if I want it to not happen, I have to do something. Like apologise. For real. For not supporting you, for just seeing it how it affected me, not how great it is for you to find something you really want to do. I've never felt that about a job, so I guess I never believed that you could really be feeling that about a company. Especially this company. For reasons previously explained. All I've ever thought about a place like this is what it takes away from you. Your freedom. Not about what it gives you back. Being-- fulfilled. Feeling like you're worth something. Just because I've been missing that doesn't mean you have to, too.'

'So what do we have to do for you to have it?' Kaelin asked.

'I do have it. Just not for work. For you.'

Kaelin caught his eyes. 'Trowa Barton,' he said. 'Sometimes you still surprise me.'

'I may be old, but I'm not predictable yet.'

Kaelin broke into a startled grin. Trowa kissed the corner of it. Forgot where he was, doing it, then just didn't care. Kaelin didn't let him get away with just a peck, anyway. He leaned in after Trowa, pressed their mouths together slowly, gently. At considerable length.

Trowa was hot under the collar when they finally broke apart. Those kids in the corner weren't there, now. Either they'd embarrassed their audience, or-- hell. Embarrassed their audience was pretty much the only option.

He stole the drink from Kae and took a large swallow. 'Spoilt brat.'

'Who spoils me more than you?'

'You tell me.'

'No-one. And I like it like that.'

Trowa laughed. 'Of course you do. Try to come home for dinner. I'll take you out.'

'And dessert.'

'You'll get fat,' he warned.

'I never any such thing.'

'I dunno. Too much on-the-job snacking. I'm seeing a little pooch.'

'When you look down? Don't worry. It's only because you're old.'

'On you, dumbass.'

'Must be mistaken, since this flawless body belongs to a hale and hardy twenty-two year old. Are you a hale and hardy twenty-two year old? No?'

Trowa shrugged with exaggerated nonchalance. 'Skip dessert and have sex instead.'

'Deal,' Kaelin said. 'No, wait, I had a thing worked out with cherries, so at least we need those.'

'Cherries? That's creative.'

'Prepare to be wowed.'

'I don't wow easily.' Kaelin's fingers wormed into his, and he brought them to his lips. 'You sure you want to do this again?'

'Do what again? Us?'

'Yeah.'

Kaelin gave that real consideration. Trowa appreciated that. Kaelin's signal personality point was impetuosity, and Trowa didn't kid himself which parent that came from. But that thoughtful look he wore just now, that was Quat, looking at the problem from all angles, weighing values, searching for the answer that would be right and fair and just. Maybe if Trowa had done more of that, this past month, he'd be in a better position for earning that forgiveness Quat always offered him. That Kaelin had. So he didn't say anything, didn't add anything in his own defence, because he knew what Kaelin was going to say. They would fight for each other. And when they got done with the yelling and the scheming and the sneaking around, they'd be back where they'd started-- a family was something you had to decide on. An effort you had to make. Chances, and what you did with them.

Damn. He hated it when Duo was right.

Whatever Kaelin was thinking, he saw the conclusion in bright blue eyes that turned up to him. 'I think I was hasty,' Kaelin said, 'before.'

'Your instincts have usually been good.'

'My instincts are fantastic. I don't think I listened to them a lot, the last few months. You had real concerns about me starting here. I didn't really give you credit for that. I didn't even really ask your opinion about it. I'm sorry.'

'You're allowed to do what you want.'

'Ask my parents how that goes. I don't want that to happen to us. I want us to share everything. Not just our lives. What we think, what we want. How we want to be.' Kaelin covered his hand, held him tightly. 'Promise me that. That's what I want.'

Trowa found himself with a scratchy throat. 'Yeah,' he tried, airless. He tried it again. 'Yeah. That's what I want. I promise it. I would-- do anything. For you.'

'Then we'll do it. We'll have it. No question.'

'No,' Trowa said. 'No question.'


End file.
